Beneath the Stars (Falling Stars 4)

Thumb tapping my chin, she forced a grin. “And you are young, so it doesn’t hurt to play a little, either. Figure out what you really want.”

“And what if I already know what that is?”

“Then you fight for it. You listen to it. You nurture it. But you never let it rip you apart.”

Her warning was thick.

Clotting the air.

Stifling my senses.

Sadness tightened my throat. “I won’t.”

She nodded and let her hands glide back down to mine, and she threaded our fingers together as she started to step back. She gave us a squeeze, her voice a song, “Amor, amor, amor.”

My heart nearly splintered with the magnitude of it. “Love you,” I whispered.

She released me and stepped away, leaving me with the softest smile. “I know.”

She started to leave, and I whispered, “And please don’t say anything to Emily or my brother, okay? This is between me and Rhys.”

Violet laughed a tinkling sound. “Oh, Maggie. Believe me…I’ve seen enough bloodshed. I think we can do without any more.”

Sixteen

Rhys

“Wooooooweee! Sure feels good to be on the wide open road again, don’t it?” I basically shouted it over the roarin’ of the engine of my car as we sped down the highway back toward Tybee. Richard and I had been in Savannah at a music store picking up a new amp he’d had on order.

I’d been quick to offer to drive considering I had to get out of that house before I lost my mind.

The girl was everywhere.

Too close and too far away, and it was gettin’ harder and harder pulling off that whole friend thing. Three days had passed since I’d woken up with her in my arms. Since she’d pushed me over an edge I’d promised myself we wouldn’t go.

The sweet, sweet siren having no fuckin’ clue what she was doing to me.

Even though it was hot as balls, we had the windows down, lettin’ the wind whip the air into disorder while one of the country songs Richard and I had grown up on blared from the speakers.

Dude cut me a glare.

Clutching the oh shit handle in one hand and the other to the side of the seat.

“Sure, if I was in the mood to die, which I am not. Might like to get back to my wife, thank you very much.”

Cracking up, I reached over and patted his cheek. “Always so dramatic, Richey-Poo.”

He gave me a look that promised he was half a second from ripping off my hand.

I laughed harder.

So, I loved to fuck with the dude. Guy was as serious as they came. Best around, too.

Still, I couldn’t let him get away with acting like a puss. “You hang on any tighter, you’re gonna rip the leather. She might like to be ridden hard, but she doesn’t want to be torn apart while you’re at it. Show a little respect, man. She’s a lady.”

I said it as somberly as I could.

Disbelief shook his head. “How about we start by respectin’ the speed limit?”

I scoffed. “Uh…because that’d be boring? Besides, I’m barely over.”

That was as I went flying by a car that might as well have been standing still.

“What you are is barely sane.”

He was right.

But this? This was how I managed. How I got through the day.

Laughing. Playing. Teasing. Doin’ the best that I could. Bringing a little light into all the dark.

Except I could feel myself fuckin’ that up, too. Allowing my darkness to invade. Ghosts to infiltrate.

Giving pieces of it to her, but I didn’t know how to stop from wanting to take some of hers.

Problem was, I didn’t know how to stand for her when the girl had a way of seeing straight through me. Knocking me down at the heart and dropping me to my knees.

Richard just chuckled before he got all serious again. “Practice has been good the last couple days, yeah?”

“Stellar.” It was the truth. “Best songs we’ve written.”

“Yeah…just feels…different this time. Like we’ve all figured it out. Except for you, of course.” Dude tossed me a wink at that.

I rumbled a laugh. “You just wish I wasn’t gonna show your ass up on this album.”

He grinned. “How is that song comin’?”

Slowly.

Painfully.

Erratically.

“Gonna kill it.”

“Know you will.” He didn’t even hesitate when he said it, then he glanced at me with a smirk. “Even though I’d love to see that godawful hashtag put out of its misery.”

“No misery to it.” I waggled my brows.

Crazy how that now felt like a straight-up lie. Fact that all of it was feelin’ more and more like misery because I was havin’ a hard time even contemplating going back to those ways.

Misery in the fact I hadn’t been able to since I’d been back in Dalton more than six months ago.

Since Maggie. Since that prick had been up front and center, makin’ threats again.

So I’d laid low. Kept my dick in my pants and my face out of the tabloids.