The Complete Rockstar Series (91 page)

I glance around before stepping outside. The back lot is clear. Unfortunately, we have to go around to the side of the building where I parked.

“Thanks, Bob.” I shake his hand.

“Be careful.” He pulls Abby in for another hug, whispering something in her ear that I don’t catch.

“Come on, Bee.” She puts an arm around my waist and holds on tight. “Wait.” I yank a black knit beanie out of my back pocket and shove it over her golden hair. “Put your sunglasses on and keep your head down.” She does as I ask and I tuck her back into my side. I have to go slower than I’d like because the back lot is gravel and Abby is wearing those damn heels, but she’s determined and keeps up.

Then we turn the corner.

“
T
here they are
!”

At least twenty people with cameras rush at us. Abby flinches into me, but never falters at my side. The pack descends, shouting and jostling each other—and therefore jostling us—as they fight for position.

“Guys, please. Don’t push,” I keep my voice steady when what I want to do is lash out and punch each and every one of these soulless bastards. After they dug around in my past, printed photos of the accident, used my pain to get their five minutes of entertainment out of it, I’ve had very little patience for anyone in the media.

“Who is this?”

“Are you dating?”

“Is it serious?”

“What’s your name?”

“Hawke, is she pregnant?”

“Oh my god,” Abby whispers into my ear.

“Stay with me, Bee.” I tighten the arm I have around her shoulders and it’s a good thing I do, because some asshole trips into her, making her lose her footing. Abby’s knee buckles and she goes down, my hold on her the only thing keeping her from landing on the sharp shards of rock. “Fuck off!” I shout, completely frustrated as I help her regain her footing.

“Hawke?” I glance at Abby and know her eyes are shining wetly behind the dark glasses.

I put my mouth to her ear. “Come on, Bee. You’re stronger than them.” She nods and puts her head down, letting me lead her to the car. It takes for-fucking-ever to get the mob to move with us, but we finally make it to the Mercedes.

I fling open the door, not caring that it smacks a “journalist” right in the face. My only concern is getting Abby inside and away from these bastards. Once she’s safe, I still have to circle the car, which is nearly impossible now that I don’t have Abby with me. Apparently they were giving us “space” before because now they’re packed in so tight, I crush someone’s toes every time I take a step.

“Who is that, Hawke?”

“Is it serious with her?”

I climb into the SUV and slam the door shut, praying that one of their fingers gets caught and broken. Revving the engine, I watch them scatter from in front of the vehicle and I gun it out of the parking lot to the safety of the open road.

One glance in the rearview mirror lets me know that there is no safety, no escape. At least four cars pull out of the lot and follow close behind.

Abby is sitting in the passenger seat, wide-eyed and pale. “You okay, Bee?”

“Yeah… yeah. I’m okay. That was just…”

“I know.”

“I’m sorry you got caught up in my shit.” I grip the wheel tight, angry and frustrated that those assholes ruined everything. “I understand if you don’t want to be my friend, Abby.” The words feel wrong on my tongue. I want to take them back the minute I say them, but she deserves better than an emotionally crippled guy with a perpetual paparazzi problem.

“What? Stop it,” she snaps. “I’m not going anywhere. We’re friends and that,” she jerks her thumb over her shoulder at the tailing paparazzi. “That doesn’t change a thing.”

“It doesn’t?”

“No. So don’t say that again. It’s insulting that you think I’d run away because of a few reporters.”

I choke out a dry laugh. “A few? Wait until you see what they write about you, Bee. Don’t make promises you can’t keep.” My tone is harsher than I meant.

“Don’t decide my reaction for me.” I glance over at Abby to see her scowling, her chin jutting out stubbornly.

“All right, you win. If you say it doesn’t bother you, then it doesn’t bother you.” I throw up one hand in defeat.

“Good.”

I only hope she means what she says, because even though I gave her the option, I don’t know if I can stand to lose her again.

“You had enough sun yet?”

I squint up at the shadow cast over my comfortable lounger. “I guess. What about you?”

Hawke sits on the edge of my chair, the sun-kissed skin of his muscular thighs coming in contact with my calf. I have to hold back a hiss when his touch sends a jolt of lust up my leg.

“I’m done,” he admits, giving me a crooked smile. He’s wearing dark sunglasses instead of his usual square frames, so I can’t see his beautiful eyes. It doesn’t matter, though. I’m sure they’re dancing with delight. “My tats are fried and I’m covered in sand. I need a shower.” His stomach growls loudly and we both laugh. “And a sandwich.” He pats his abs, drawing my gaze to the defined ridges covered in dark and colorful slashes of ink.

My mouth practically waters at the sight. I groan. “I’m hungry too.” Yep. I could easily devour every inch of his body.

Hawke tilts his head, giving me a knowing look.

“For food,” I clarify. “Hungry for food. A sandwich sounds good.” Hawke raises his eyebrows. “Just get up,” I huff. He’s too sexy and he’s half naked and touching me. How can I be expected to form a coherent sentence?

Hawke purses his lips, but doesn’t tease me. “Okay. Food. Let’s go inside. I’m sure Gavin has something we can eat.”

“It’s nice of him to let us use his beach while he’s out of town with Mitch,” I mention while shoving my towel and other things into a large tote.

“It is. But Gavin’s that kind of guy.” Hawke takes the bag from me and slings it on his shoulder.

“What kind of guy?” I ask as we trudge across the nearly deserted beach to Gavin’s ultra-modern white and glass house.

“Kind, considerate, caring… pretty much everything I’m not,” Hawke says.

“Hey.” I grab his arm, pulling him to a stop on the back steps of the deck. He reluctantly faces me and I wish I could see his eyes. Why can’t I? I reach up and push the sunglasses back onto his head, revealing those expressive multicolored eyes. “You are all of those things.” I let the back of my fingers skim down the side of his face. Hawke closes his eyes and leans into my touch, his breath hitching when he exhales. When I realize what I’m doing, I snatch my hand back.

This is a dangerous game I’m playing. I could very easily see myself falling back down the rabbit hole with Hawke, one I won’t be able to climb out of again. Even if he reciprocates my feelings, nothing about us has changed. Yes, we’re older, but we still have the same exact issues creating a gaping chasm between us.

Hawke opens his eyes and ducks his head to avoid my gaze. “Let’s get cleaned up and get some food.”

After a much needed shower and change of clothes, we manage to throw together a pretty decent lunch of pasta salad and cold grilled chicken that Gavin had in his fridge. Hawke and I have been hanging out for several weeks now, as friends. I’ve been trying to find a good time to bring up the fact that I know about the accident, but it never feels like the timing is right. The best case scenario when I finally do is for Hawke to be upset. The worst is that he pulls away and stops speaking to me completely.

We climb into Hawke’s SUV for the long drive back to the city from Gavin’s house on Huntington Beach. Knowing he’s trapped in the car with me for the next hour or so, I blurt it out without thinking.

“I’m sorry about your family.”

Hawke goes rigid in the driver’s seat. He presses his mouth into a tight line and his shoulders hunch over from stress.

“I don’t want to talk about it.” His voice is flat. I know him well enough to recognize his attempt to remain calm.

“Maybe you should. Have you ever? Spoken to anyone, that is?”
Why am I doing this?
Hawke clearly doesn’t want me prying into his past. Everything he’s done and said before, everything about his body language right now, is screaming for me to shut up, but I can’t. Years of waiting for answers renders me unable to stop.

I’m glad we’re in the car, because if we weren’t, Hawke would be long gone by now, a cartoon trail of dust trailing behind. “Don’t psychoanalyze me, Abby,” he warns, his tone serious.

“I’m not. I’m your friend, not your therapist. I care about you.”

“If I wanted to discuss it, I’d have told you a long time ago.”

That hurt. Hawke is almost out of patience with me, I can tell. “Okay. I’m sorry.” It’s impossible to keep the melancholy out of my voice. I catch Hawke wincing at my sorrowful tone. “I won’t bring it up again. I just hate seeing you suffer.”

He grits his teeth together, the muscles in his cheek pulsing. Without warning, Hawke jerks the SUV into an empty parking lot and slams it into park. He tilts his head in my direction but doesn’t meet my eyes. “You obviously already read about what happened. Now you know why I’m fucked up. I watched my entire family die in front of me, Abby. You can’t erase that shit. You can’t make it better or undo it. Talking about it won’t bring them back.” I can’t tell if Hawke is getting angrier or more miserable as he speaks.

“You can—”

“Fuck, Abby! Stop it! It’s my fault they died, okay? I was stupid and needed a ride and they fucking died because of it! That’s the end of it! I killed my parents and sister and it’s done!”

All of the blood in my face drains to my feet.

Holy shit. I was not expecting that.

Abby and I have come to a peaceful, if awkward, truce. She doesn’t bring up my past or any of my issues and I hold back all of my raw desire to have her, hiding the way I desperately want her in my arms and in my bed. Somehow, despite our challenges, we’ve managed to become friends, good friends. It’s almost reminiscent of the time we spent together in our early twenties, before we dated and I fucked everything up.

Today, it’s quite possible that we’re embarking on the worst idea ever. Of course it was
my
stupid idea, and I’m about to repeat history by fucking everything up again.

The buzzer by the front door echoes through my condo, letting me know the driver is here. I take one last look in the full-length mirror in my bedroom. I don’t bother with stylists. I know my style and what the fans want. I’m wearing a typical “Hawke Evans” outfit—skinny black jeans, tight faded vintage T-shirt with an open, black suit jacket over it, the sleeves cuffed to show the colorful tattoos on my forearms. My dark hair is longer on top, but swept back off my face. By the end of the night, half of it will likely be hanging in front of my face. Last but not least, my dad’s black-framed glasses are perched on my face.

“Friends. You can do this, Hawke.”

I stare at my reflection, into the brown and blue eyes looking back at me. Girls love the man they see, the playful, pierced and tattooed bad boy. The guy who looks harmless enough, nonthreatening, wearing Converse sneakers and nerdy glasses. The lip, brow, and tongue jewelry, plus the tattoos, are enough to give the girls not brave enough to go for the real asshole types a bit of a thrill.

If they only knew how
not
harmless I really am. The guy I see in the mirror is a first-class prick, selfish and loaded down with enough fucked-up baggage to sink the Titanic.

The buzzer sounds again, startling me. I frown at my reflection and head downstairs.

“Joel.” I nod at the familiar driver sent over by my record label.

“Mr. Evans,” he says, opening the back door of the sleek black sedan.

“You have the address?” I ask as he pulls the car away from the curb.

“All set, Mr. Evans.”

Satisfied Joel will get me to our next destination, I put up the tinted glass divider, sealing the back of the car in silence. I drum my restless fingers on my knee the entire drive, which should take twenty minutes but naturally, with hideous LA traffic, it takes forty. By the time the car slows to a stop in front of Abby’s small beach cottage, sweat is trickling down the back of my shirt, the fabric sticking to my skin between my shoulder blades, and I’m a nervous wreck.

Joel doesn’t get a chance to open the car door. I shove it open to leap out on the pavement, in a hurry to get to Abby’s front door before I change my mind and take off. This entire night has the potential to blow up in my face big time. I don’t know what prompted me to ask Abby to be my date for the awards ceremony I have to go to tonight. To justify it, I like to tell myself it’s because all the other guys are bringing significant others and I’m tired of being the pathetic single guy. But the real reason is much more complicated. Selfish as always, I
want
Abby with me, on my arm, calming me down, showing her off for the cameras… even if we’re just friends.

Abby answers the door before I reach the small set of porch stairs. Her smile is tentative, not quite reaching her eyes. She’s as nervous as me.

“Hi.” Abby blushes and averts her gaze. Long, dark lashes flutter against smooth, rosy skin.

Wow. My date is stunning. I know Kate hooked her up with a stylist so she wouldn’t have to worry about what to wear. I owe her big time for creating the vision in front of me. “You look incredible,” I blurt out, causing Abby’s cheeks to flush an even darker shade of red.

“Thanks,” she says so softly I have to lean in close to hear her.

Big mistake.

Abby’s familiar scent envelops me. The light floral fragrance with traces of the beach has my blood pounding in my veins like molten lava, the majority of it heading straight for my dick.

I try to shake the thoughts out of my head. It’s not exactly appropriate to have a massive hard-on when picking up Abby for her date as
my friend
. I want to touch her so badly I could scream. Despite my attempts to divert my brain, images of ripping the tight blue gown off her perfect body and sinking deep inside her tight hot pussy dominate my thoughts. Instead of grabbing her, touching, smelling, tasting… I dig my fingernails into my palm and bite the inside of my cheek until I taste blood.