Who Do You Love (Rock Royalty Book 7) (12 page)

Bad idea!

But still so damn appealing that he had to force himself to walk away.

In the kitchen, he made coffee and was sipping from his favorite mug when he heard her first strokes on the strings. With a little smile, he listened to her tune the instrument, and then she was playing something with a distinctly Spanish flavor. It cheered him to have her making music nearby again. Then the familiarity of the song caught up with him. The Beatles’ “Yesterday” played flamenco-style.

His smile died as the melancholy lyrics rolled through his head, plummeting his mood. Trouble’s here to stay.

Damn!

He needed fresh air, a fast walk, a session at his fight gym with the punching bag.

When he heard her stop playing and then her footsteps in the hallway, he nearly flung open the sliding glass doors and hurdled the balcony railing for a swim in the oh-shit-cold water in order to escape. Troubles here to stay. That’s what he’d brought to her.

“Hey,” she said. “Coffee?”

He glanced around, taking in her pale face and shadowed eyes. Had he told Spence he knew what he was doing? Had Eamon really believed that shutting them up together was the best idea?

Pouring her a mug of hot caffeine didn’t improve his temperament. Even the small smile she gave him when he handed her the milk didn’t soothe.

“Thanks for this,” she said, returning the carton to his waiting hand. “And many, many thanks for whatever magic trick it took to bring me a guitar.”

He grunted. “I know it’s your second favorite. Bart is on a mission to see if we can get the pellet holes repaired on the other one.”

“Oh, don’t both—”

“It’s happening if at all possible,” he said, frowning. “Don’t fight me on that.”

Her brows jumped high “Yikes. You’re grouchy,” she said, making him feel even more like shit.

“Sorry,” he muttered.

On a shrug, she wandered toward the glass doors, then quickly spun around, a new flush on her cheeks and a real sparkle in her eyes.

“Sand! I see sand down there! Can we go for a walk on the beach?”

Fresh air. Fast walk. A session at the fight club. Well, two out of three wasn’t bad. And he couldn’t squelch the first real eagerness she’d shown since arriving at his house.

“Yeah. Just a sec. Let me get my sunglasses.”
And my gun.

Stairs along the side of the house led down to the empty beach. There was a public access, but it was hard to find and using it had to be timed to the tides, so this stretch of sand was often deserted. On the bottom step, Cami slipped out of her shoes and rolled up the legs of her jeans.

“First one who finds a whole shell gets to make a wish,” she said, and hurried toward the shoreline, her heels digging small cups in the wet sand.

His longer legs quickly caught up with her.

“What would you wish for?” he asked, curious. “Besides my heart on a platter, that is.”

She glanced up from her scan of the beach. “So you actually have one?”

Yeah. Deserved that.
Rubbing his chest, he watched her stroll away from him, jumping like a little shorebird when the oncoming water rolled over her toes. The sun caught the gold strands in her already bright hair, and he pulled on his shades as he trailed behind her. Her face lifted to the warm sunshine, a real smile curving her lips.

The sight of it lightened his leaden mood. To prove that things were looking up, a few feet away he spied a perfect shell, a common sort, but still beautiful with its narrow bands of color that mimicked a dawn sky—creamy pinks and blues and yellows. He bent for it, then gave it a flick with his wrist so it popped her in the butt.

Her head whipped around, and she frowned at him until he nodded to the small item that had landed near her feet.

“Must be your lucky day,” he said.

Cami scooped up the small shell, cradled it in the palm of her hand and closed her eyes. “You might have found it first, but I’m taking the wish.”

And he thought,
I’d give you everything if I could.

But the very fact that she’d been endangered because of her association with him proved the futility of the wish. The knowledge of that, as well as just looking at her lovely face, was making him ache, so he directed his gaze toward the ocean. Taking in a long breath, he tried to clear his head.

Then movement caught his attention. He watched a moment before calling Cami’s name. “You’re going to want to open your eyes and take a look at this
a ghrá geal
.”

He felt her come up beside him. Without thinking, he snagged her arm and brought her around in front of him, their bodies pressed close. He bent his head to hers so they were cheek to cheek and pointed past the surf line. “Just there. See?”

He heard and felt her quick indrawn breath. “Dolphins.”

Five or six, surfacing and diving and circling, the sunshine turning their skin to silver, and when they leaped, transforming the fountain of water droplets to a shower of cascading pearls.

They appeared to be chasing each other now, the happy-go-lucky pursuit roiling the surface of the water.

“Reminds me of when I was a kid,” he said, smiling. “Running with a passel of playmates for Tag or Capture the Flag or any game that caught our fancy.”

She glanced up at him over her shoulder. “I thought you were an only child.”

“But not the only kid in the MC. The Unrulies put a lot of emphasis on family, and there were—are—barbecues almost every weekend and on each holiday. Everybody comes to party.” He grinned as her eyebrow rose at the last word. “Party
tamely
,” he added, “until the kids go home.”

“Hmm.” She turned to face him, her expression speculative. “I’m trying to see it.”

“What?”

“I know you have a motorcycle, but I’m trying to picture you in one of those leather vest-thingies with all the patches.”

“It’s called a cut and those are for members only.” As a young boy, he’d imagined the day when he’d be accepted as part of the brotherhood and able to proudly fly the Unruly Assassins colors.

“You’re the president’s son—”

“But I won’t ever be one of them. It’s an old story. Bottom line, Dad promised Mom. So instead of following in his footsteps, I’m an upstanding lawyer turned P.I.”

“There’s got to be more to it than that.”

“Not today.” Not when the sun continued to shine and the air smelled so clean and Cami stood close enough that he could pretend there was no chasm between them.

She studied him a second more.

“Let’s keep walking then,” she said, and then caught his hand to tug him forward.

His fingers folded over hers, and she didn’t pull away as they continued north. But he made sure not to hold too tight, keeping the contact friendly and companionable, to assure her that her welfare was his only concern.

That was all he’d allow himself to desire—her safety.

“There were parties when I was growing up, too,” Cami said as they dodged a rogue wave. “At the compound. Well, there are still parties at the compound when the Lemons are in town.”

“Legendary happenings.”

Wild, according to all reports. Attended by celebrities and fame whores who came for bottles of alcohol and bowls of drugs and who stayed for the scandalous games and naked escapades.

His chest suddenly tightened. The thought of a young and lovely Cami in those shark-infested waters made him queasy. “You didn’t…”

She was shaking her head. “The boys all had a taste or two—or more—once they were in their teens. But not me or Cilla.”

Eamon could breathe again.

“I wanted to follow the music and laughter and lights, though.” She sighed. “I always felt so lonesome. Stuck alone in my room, hearing the merriment from afar.”

He squeezed her hand, thinking of how she’d tried to turn the frightening hunting trophies into amiable friends.

“I imagined you with that tribe you have going now, all of you rambunctious as puppies and tumbling around Laurel Canyon together.”

“It wasn’t like that. For whatever reason we never mingled much…not until Ren came back from London and let Cilla steal his heart.”

Slipping out of his hold, Cami turned to face him. The wind swirled in her bright hair, sending some of it over her nose and mouth like a veil. Above it, her green eyes caught the light, looking like the sun illuminating shallow sea water.

An ocean sprite, he thought now. No fairy, but an ocean sprite. And if he looked away she’d dive into the surf, her legs transforming into a tail as the water closed around them, and in a blink she’d be gone, bound for the Pacific’s depths. He’d lose her.

But hadn’t he already? For her safety, he reminded himself. He’d given Cami up to keep her safe.

Her small hands tucked her hair behind her ears.

“And now the Rock Royalty are all paired up—except me,” she continued. “So you see, I’m like you. I know what it is to be on the outside.”

He opened his mouth to deny the charge. On the outside? But, hell, he was, when it came to the Unrulies. Though he had Spence, other friends, not to mention his mother who expected a phone call every few days…

Still, it wasn’t the same.

The last time he hadn’t been aware of that cold, hollow core of loneliness permanently lodged in his heart was when he’d been with Cami.

Whether she was singing in the club—and it seemed as if she was singing just to him—or they were in her small house in bed or over breakfast, he’d been warm, at ease, the whole of him filled.

And he had to wonder now if that was the more honest reason why he’d kept their relationship so secretive. He’d enjoyed the two of them belonging to their own private society, no others invited in.

It had been a way to keep her for himself.

Her brows drew together. “Don’t look so sad.”

Sad?

Then she launched herself into his arms and clung to him, delivering a hug she probably intended as nothing more than friendly.

But the press of her small body to his sent it a non-chummy message. Desire began buzzing through his blood as he closed one arm about her waist and used his other hand to tuck her head against his chest.

She squeezed tighter. “Eamon, don’t be sad.”

Don’t be sad.

The sweetness of that shook him up and turned his world upside down. Pal was lover. Resolve was smoke. And safe…

Well, she might still be that, but with her in his arms, her kind concern ringing in his ears—
Eamon, don’t be sad—
he was fucked.

Because he wanted her now more than he had the day he’d told her goodbye.

Cami paused in the doorway of the master bedroom suite at Eamon’s Malibu house. The room’s dimensions were even more generous than that of her own. At one end, a doorway leading to the bathroom, at the other, a matching desk, shelves, and filing set-up that comprised an efficient and tasteful home office space. Between the two stood a bed.

Instead of looking at that, she directed her attention to the man, his attention on a laptop computer, his long body stretched out on a modern-styled reclining chair covered in black leather and with stainless steel accents.

Huh. It was the motorcycle of reclining chairs.

Brushing the thought aside, she crossed her arms over her chest, in preparation for a fight.

“This isn’t going to work,” she declared.

“What?” He didn’t glance up, his gaze still on the laptop resting on his thighs.

Powerful thighs, dressed in dark slacks. His tie lay discarded across the desk, and he’d rolled up the sleeves of his crisp white shirt. The dress shoes and socks he’d worn earlier were tumbled by the desk.

Cami’s belly quivered. There was something about a man in business clothes with bare feet and bare forearms…

Or maybe it was Eamon in business clothes with bare feet and bare forearms. Before, she’d only seen him dressed in casual wear—jeans and rumpled khakis, T-shirts and Henleys with the occasional sweatshirt pulled over. Leather jackets instead of suit jackets, like the one slung on a padded hanger clipped over the closet door.

It made him seem like a stranger.

A sexy, dangerous stranger.

“Did you forget what you wanted to say?”

She jumped, then glared at him. “It was you who didn’t hear me. So I’ll repeat, this isn’t going to work.”

“Give me a second to finish this email, okay?”

Her mouth moved, silently mimicking him.
Give me a second to finish this email
. Then she huffed out an impatient sigh as the request only served to remind her that he had something to do. Places to go, people to see, a purpose besides sitting around waiting.

He’d gone out in the morning, intent on some “pressing business,” leaving her in the meaty hands of taciturn Bart, who had sat sprawled in a chair by the front door the entire four hours Eamon had been gone, playing some game on his phone.

A clipped noise signaled her current irritating bodyguard had shut down the laptop. Eamon set it aside. “You look tired. Do you need a nap?”

At the question, her gaze jumped—of its own accord—to his bed. The coverlet was a checkerboard pattern of gray and black and lay smoothly over the mattress. Plump pillows sat stacked neatly against the gray leather headboard. If she’d had to guess, she would never suppose him to be a man who made his bed in the morning.

When they’d shared hers, they’d awoken to a twisted mass of sheets and blankets, haphazardly gathered around their entwined bodies. It had been she who put it to rights while he stumbled to the kitchen to make them both coffee.

He’d bring back one huge mug that he’d share with her, holding it to her mouth to sip. It was his hands that had fed her, too—grapes and slivers of apple and fingers of cinnamon-and-sugar laden toast.
You need the calories. I wore you out last night.

A shudder worked down her spine, and she yanked her gaze back to him—Business Eamon.

“I don’t need a nap. I need to get out of here.”

His brows met over his nose. “You don’t like the house?”

At that moment, one of the bigger waves rolled in, and she felt the floor vibrate beneath her feet. She glanced over her shoulder and, through another ceiling-height slider, saw the foam of it suck back out to the sea stretching toward the horizon.