Kiss the Stars (Falling Stars 1)

My lips pursed in anguish. “One mistake. One I’m not ever going to have the chance to make up for.”

His face pinched, and his teeth clamped down on his bottom lip as he shifted forward another inch. The muscles in his arms ticked.

I couldn’t tell if it was rage or desire.

If he was holding himself back or letting himself go.

“You don’t know that, Mia. You have no idea what a monster is going to do. When a man is nothing but cruel and vile. The length he will go. The thirst for blood.”

My entire being cringed at the thought. “That is something I will never understand. Life is precious. It should be treasured and cherished. How could someone take it so casually and carelessly?”

His expression shifted.

Grief.

Regret.

Hatred.

My insides trembled.

God. Who was this man?

He fisted his big hands between his knees. “Sometimes people become monsters without knowing it’s happening. Caught up in lawlessness before they realize who they have become.”

I searched him, unsure of what he was saying. What he was implying. Only knowing the way that I saw him. “And then there are good people. Selfless people who will hurl themselves over a wall without knowing what they might be coming up against to protect someone else.”

His laughter was rough.

A rebuttal.

“And sometimes people go running into danger in the hopes of making amends, knowing they could never pay a penalty so big, but knowing they will spend their entire lives trying, anyway.”

“Is that what you’re doing . . . making amends? For what?”

I could feel his disturbance vibrate the ground.

“I should go.”

He started to stand.

My hand flew out and wrapped around his calf. Our gazes clashed as I looked up at him.

A shockwave of intensity

“Stay,” I managed to say.

He heaved out the strain, cursing low before he slowly sat back down. My hand was still on his calf, refusing to let go.

“You don’t want to get inside me, Mia. Know you think you do, but I promise you, that is not a place you want to be. You can’t fix me.” The words were gruff and low. A warning.

“And what if I were to like what I was to see?”

His dark chuckle curled in the space between us, and his hand was reaching out, tilting up my chin. “Like I said, you’d only see your own beauty reflected back. I am no good, Mia. You don’t know me, and I promise, you don’t want to.”

My hand was shaking like crazy when I forced myself to let go of his leg. I reached to reclaim my wine glass, bringing it to my lips. I fought for normalcy. To find that uneasy casualness that we’d shared for the last few days, but that seemed impossible when he was sitting this close.

“So . . . how is playing with the band? Practice is going well?”

There.

As normal as could be.

He let go of a short laugh when he realized what I was doing.

A reprieve from the severity.

“It’s good. Guys are crazy talented. It’s an honor to play with them.”

“That’s funny because Lyrik said the same thing about you.”

“Your brother is delusional.”

“He said you pretty much rewrote a song that was giving him fits.”

“Fits? He said that?” Leif teased, lightness weaving into his tone and his face lifting into an easy smile.

God, that was pretty, too.

I peeked back. “Okay, fine, he might have said it was fucking with his head and he was about to commit homicide on the next poor, unsuspecting asshole that looked at him wrong. Same diff.”

A smile played across his mouth. The man exuding a dark, dark confidence. I wanted to slip into the shadows of it.

“You rockstars are so dramatic.” I rolled my eyes. Reminding myself why I’d convinced myself rockstars were so not my type all those years ago. I didn’t have the time or the space for the pain.

But Leif’s?

I wanted his.

To shoulder some of it.

Pray that in his aftermath he didn’t leave me crushed.

“It was no big deal. He almost had it. Was just missing something. Great song, honestly.”

I let my eyes trace him, like I could add up all the parts that made him whole. The pieces that formed who he was. “Honest?”

“Wow. Loaded question much?” he teased.

I grinned. “You don’t look much like a country drummer to me.”

He laughed a self-deprecating sound. “No . . . but sometimes it’s stupid not to take opportunities when they’re presented to you.”

“Like Sunder offered you?”

“Yeah.”

“You want my honest?” I asked.

“Shoot.”

“It seems like a better fit.”

His mouth quirked at the side, and the slight dimple showed in his cheek.

I had the urge to lick it.

“You better not let Zee hear you saying that.”

Effortless laughter floated out. “He’s like a brother to me. I’ll be sure to use it the next time we get into a spat.”

The hardness around Leif’s eyes softened more. “You’re all close.” He glanced at the main house. “You want my honest?”