Truth

I swallowed and lied, “Nothing. He was just telling me how much he was going to miss me.” Then I gave a slight smile, and Reid rolled his eyes before strolling to the tiny kitchen area.

Jackson gave me a barely noticeable nod from afar, and I did the same to him.

Being careful with Reid was going to be difficult, considering it seemed I’d already misplaced my trusty hard hat. I’d say it was laying somewhere in Reid’s bed after waking up with our limbs tangled together.

Chapter Seventeen

Reid

Walking up to the door of my nana’s house truly hit home. It’d been two years since she’d passed, and it still felt like yesterday. I knew that grandparents, and even parents, weren’t supposed to be around forever, but I’d lost both of them before I even got to my mid-twenties. I still felt like I needed my nana, but I supposed that was the child inside of me speaking. Even just walking through the door made my stomach clench with grief.

I could feel Brooklyn behind me, taking in the scene with that quietness she always carried around with her. I shouldn’t have brought her. I shouldn’t have even been alone in the same room with her—not after last night—but here we were. Alone. In a private place. After having her stay in my room last night and then us falling asleep in my bed. God. What was I thinking? She fell asleep before me, her little head nodding off and on after we’d just sat on my bed, untouching.

We were in our own world.

That was how it felt with Brooklyn—like we were in our own little world, like the rest of the population would have been fine without us. I was using her. I knew it. I knew I was hanging onto her because she, somehow, was able to silence the shitty thoughts that I had rolling around in my head. I had promised I would never use another woman as a muse—not after Angelina—but here I was, hoarding a notebook full of potential songs, and each one was about her.

I couldn’t help myself last night. She was sleeping so peacefully in my bed, looking more beautiful than ever, and it was like a floodgate was opened. So many words. So many verses. They were coming at me so fast I couldn’t even grip the pencil hard enough to write them all down. I was out of breath by the end. Sweating. Mentally exhausted.

My walls were down last night. Completely demolished.

It may have been the phone call from Darcy that sent me over the edge, learning that Angelina was in a psychiatric unit and her parents were still withholding information about her.

Or maybe it was just the fact that, when she walked into my room, I didn’t want to push away all the shit I’d been shrugging off since the very beginning. Somehow, my hatred and annoyance for being given a “teacher” did a total 180. She gave me life and inspiration; everything about her lit me up inside like a thousand torches being lit at the exact same time. And last night, I allowed those torches to burn for far longer than I should have.

And it was a mistake.

Using someone like Brooklyn was wrong—for both of us. Using her as a muse meant that she was doing something to me, something on a deeper level, wiggling her way into my life, my mind, everything. And there was no fucking way in hell I was getting wrapped up in another woman like before.

I couldn’t. And I needed to face the facts: Brooklyn and I could never work. Even if I did somehow move on from the Angelina shit, Brooklyn and I were in two different worlds. It would never work. She didn’t belong in a world like mine; she was too pure, too sweet. The media would eat her alive.

So, after I’d written for a few hours last night, I slammed the notebook shut and tucked it away, ignoring what had just happened.

Then I crashed.

I crashed so hard that I didn’t wake until Brooklyn’s smooth, warm legs were wrapped around mine. I hadn’t slept that good since before Angelina went off the deep end, and it made me feel weak. It made me feel weak because, instead of regretting the fact that we woke up tangled up in one another, instead of pushing her away, I all but pulled her in cl

oser, craving even more.

And I was still being weak having her here with me, alone, at my nana’s house, to work on songs. I didn’t need help with music. The ability to write songs was still inside of me. It was embedded inside my bones; it ran through my veins. I just wasn’t sure I wanted to say the words out loud that I’d written inside my notebook. If I said them aloud, shared them with the world, then the walls I’d constructed so carefully to guard myself would be like a two-way mirror. There’d be no hiding anything, from anyone.

“Is this where you grew up?” Brooklyn’s voice shot through my thoughts. I spun around to find her standing in the middle of the darkened entryway with her arms hanging down by her sides. Her small, heart-shaped face looked up, and she gazed around the walls.

I chuckled. “No, definitely not.”

Brooklyn’s hand ran along the old, antique table sitting near the doorway. “But I thought your nana raised you.” Then she paused, eyes wide. “I mean, not that I would know that…I must have heard that somewhere.”

A deep chuckle escaped me. I wonder how much Brooklyn learned from Googling me? I turned around and started to walk down the hallway and into the kitchen. “She did,” I called out. “But we didn’t live here. I bought this for her after my first tour.”

“Oh,” Brooklyn answered from behind, nearly running into me. My throat caught in my chest at the mere thought of her brushing against my body. I quickly moved to the other side of the kitchen and opened the fridge, making sure it was fully stocked like I’d asked Betty, the woman who looked after the house while I was away, to do.

“This is the house that she always dreamt of having, so I bought it outright from the owner, paying entirely too much.” I shrugged, rummaging around for a water. “But it made her happy, and that was my life goal. Plus, money’s just money.”

Brooklyn’s harsh laugh filled the room. “That’s easy for you to say.”

I spun around after shutting the fridge and handed her a water. “What is?”

“That money’s just money. When you don’t have money, it’s not that simple.”