Rhys’s deep brown eyes twinkled with mirth. The guy couldn’t be serious to save his life.
Leif kicked him again. This time hard. “God, man. Do you have no tact?”
Rhys hiked his shoulders again. “What? I was born in a barn. Remember?”
“You wish, Cowboy,” Melanie said, rollin’ her eyes.
“Stallion, Mells Bells, stallion. How many times do I have to tell you?”
“That’s it. You’re getting your ass left in Dalton, Rhys,” she said. “I can’t be on this bus with you for another day.”
We were playing a show in South Carolina and then had a couple days off to stay in Dalton, South Carolina.
Our hometown.
My chest swelled with the thought of being in my mama’s kitchen, the smell of freshly baked biscuits and love in the air.
I couldn’t wait.
I needed a breather.
A break from all of this pressure.
“Not about the money,” Royce said, gaze falling on me as if I were the ultimate target.
An exotic destination.
Shivers raced. Temperature rising to 150 degrees. If I stayed in his space for a second longer, I was going to combust.
I shot to standing. “I’m gonna go work on some music in the back. Goodnight, everyone.”
Waving an awkward hand, I scrambled for the back like my tail was on fire.
Good thing I was going for subtle. But it wasn’t like I hadn’t been all sorts of neurotic lately. At this point, I was pretty sure they expected it.
Heart in my throat, I fumbled down the narrow aisle of bunks, almost gasping out for the fresh air when I made it to the back room. At least in there, there was only the vague, lingering scent of Royce coating the room.
I didn’t bother flipping on the light switch. I went right for my guitar, pulled her out of her case, and cradled her on my lap in the wafting darkness that slashed in through the windows.
Blinks of light and miles of shadows.
There was something comforting about it. The stars drooping low, as if I could reach out and brush my fingertips through them. Stir them up and twirl them around. Maybe become a part of them if I could somehow manage to get close enough.
I flipped open my notebook to where I’d been working.
Shock raked from my lungs when I saw the scraps of ripped paper that had been tucked inside. I picked them up, my eyes adjusting to the dim light, rereading the lyrics that had begun to weave, the hum of a tune infiltrating my mind.
Come to me
I’ve been waiting for a break.
Looking for something to save me from myselfI moved to the first sheet he’d tucked under my door.
Have you been looking for someone
To fill up what you’re missing
Who is it who’s gonna stop you
From the circle that keeps going ’roundI shifted that one behind to find the one I’d left on his nightstand four mornings ago.
My life a spiral
You sent me spinning
I’ve lost control
Now I’m questioning everything I think I knowMy heart raced like mad when I shifted that one behind the others to find a new one waiting, again written in that bold, masculine script.
I already hit rock bottom
Waiting to catch you now
It’s you, little mind-wrecker
Trippin’ me up long before you could knowEverything squeezed, my heart and my belly and the hold that I had on my guitar.
The glue that melded us together.
Breaths heaving from my lungs, I spread the pieces of paper out on the seat, and I strummed that low, echoing chord, humming beneath my breath as I let my spirit chase down the song.
Threads of the obscure melody encircled me.
Comforting and right.
Even quieter, I began to piece together the lyrics as I picked through the progression of the patchwork song.
My fingers fumbled on the strings when I felt the presence overpower the room.
That lingering scent was no longer just a hint.
It was an inundation. A torrent of longing that hit the air.
Cedar and a dark, decadent promise of sex.
Shivers raced across the surface of my skin.
Slowly, I opened my eyes to find him standing in the small doorway, so much like he’d been the first day he’d stepped onto the bus. Only now, everything felt different.
Ominous and bleak and foreboding.
Hopeful and bright and burning.
The man a dichotomy I wanted to discover.
“What are you doin’ back here?” I asked.
Tension bound.
Pushing at him.
Pulling at me.
A tremble of irrevocable desire that banded us like a tether.
Royce stepped forward and slowly slid the door closed behind him. His massive shadow towered over me. A wraith I wanted to disappear into.
“Was worried about you,” he grunted.
I tried to focus on him through the muted flashes of light that strobed through the trees whipping by at the side of the narrow, winding country road.
His sharp jaw and his defined cheeks and his powerful brow.
But it was those onyx eyes that had me pinned. Intensity brimming from their depths.