It was the biggest lie I had ever spoken, but Jace didn’t need to know that even if I was sure that Lucy suspected.
I heard Jace inhale deeply again and gritted my teeth at how aware of him I was. “I’ll come sit with you, Lucy. If you come back and talk to Harris.”
“See you later, Jace. It was good talking to you. Maybe we’ll see you next Wednesday.” Lucy was quick to dismiss him. I watched out of the corner of my eye while she pulled out her phone, ignoring Jace now.
“You aren’t coming tomorrow night to watch Tainted Knights?” He sounded disappointed.
“I’ve seen you and your band play before,” Lucy told him, her gaze still on her phone. “I’m sure I’m not going to miss anything important. The only reason I’m even here now is because of Kin. As soon as she’s done, we’re leaving.”
“Damn it, Lucy. Harris wants to see you.” His tone was full of frustration, but there was no way I was just going to sit there and let him talk to her like that.
I stiffened and lifted my head to find Lucy calmly meeting Jace’s gaze, not even fazed by his tone. “I’m right here.”
“He’s busy, Lucy. Give the guy a break. He’s had a rough week.”
“I wouldn’t know anything about that,” Lucy assured him with a shrug that should have looked careless, but to me looked like she was hurting. “He hasn’t called or texted me in over a week.”
The chair between me and Lucy was pulled back, and Jace sat down. I tried hard to turn m
y attention back to my song, but with him now sitting less than a foot away I was helpless to not feel his presence to my damn marrow. I caught the scent of his cologne, that spicy male scent that he fucking knew I loved, and gritted my teeth against the sudden rush of desire as it pooled between my legs.
Jerk.
Jace
I understood why Kin and Lucy Thornton were such good friends. The two little hell cats were just alike. Their freaking personalities were so similar they could have been doppelgängers. It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, because God knew how hot Kin could get me with her sassy, ball-busting personality, but it sure as fuck drove me up the wall when she was being so stubborn that she wouldn’t even give me two seconds of her time.
Lucy, I’d learned over the last few months that I’d known her, was the exact same way, if not more so. But where Kin was unable to forgive, Lucy had always seemed to be able to put shit behind her and move on once she had cooled off. She wasn’t completely unreasonable about things.
Normally.
Right then, however, I could see she wasn’t going to be the rational one about the situation between her and Harris. I couldn’t really blame her. My friend had acted like an idiot, kissing her and then avoiding her for over a week. Sure, I understood that he was scared of what not only his father would do to him but what the Demon that was Jesse Thornton would do, but truthfully, if it had been me and Kin in the same situation, I wouldn’t have given two fucks about anything but having her in my life.
Fuck anything but the girl I loved.
Gritting my teeth as that thought filled my head, I scooted my chair closer to Kin’s. Fuck this shit. I needed to follow my own advice and fight for the girl I was desperate to have back in my life instead of just waiting for her to forgive me. She needed a reason to trust me again, to know that I wasn’t going to leave her behind ever again. That started right that second.
Her auburn head lifted from the notebook that I knew she always wrote everything from her songs to her beautiful poetry in. Blue eyes frosted over when she saw how close I was, but I just grinned at her and leaned over the table to take a look at what she was writing. “What’s this one about?” I asked as I skimmed over the few lines I could see.
She shrugged. “It’s about a girl who hates this guy so much she cuts his dick off and feeds it to the sharks that frequently swim in the ocean behind her bastard father’s house.”
“Ouch,” I muttered, but my grin stayed in place.
“Wroth Niall has a really badass machete,” Lucy commented as she turned her attention back to her phone. “I can ask him to overnight it to me and lend it to you, Kin.”
A smile teased at my girl’s lips and my heart literally stalled in my chest at the sight. When was the last time I’d seen Kin smile, even that little bitty smile that was teasing at her lips right then? The sad truth was, I couldn’t remember and my gut twisted with regret. Damn it, Kin should always smile. That I was one of the reasons she didn’t anymore fucking killed me.
Her head lifted and she winked at Lucy. “I’ll let you know if I need to take you up on that, babe.”
“Hey, you’re Jesse Thornton’s kid.”
My head shot up at the sound of some guy’s voice just as Lucy and Kin turned to face the newcomer. I could tell this douchebag was going to be trouble just by looking at him. He had some smug-ass grin on his face, like he was an actual somebody who deserved everything handed to him. The guy standing behind him didn’t appear to be nearly as much of a prick as his friend but, when his gaze went to Kin, I was ready to knock his teeth down his throat.
Lucy’s brows lifted as she looked up at the guy who had just spoken. “I’m Lucy Thornton,” she told him with a new coolness to her tone that I hadn’t heard often from her.
Without being asked to join us, the douchebag pulled out the chair between me and Lucy and dropped down into it like he owned the fucking place. When his friend pulled a chair up on the other side of Kin, I couldn’t keep my hands from balling into fists. Yeah, I’d love to make that prick eat some teeth.
“What’s it like to be a rock star’s kid?” the guy beside Lucy asked as he leaned closer.