Prologue
“I don’t know what to do.”
“Don’t look at me, it’s not my decision.”
I rolled my eyes at him. “Very helpful.”
“What do you want from me? I’m not going to beg you to stay.”
“I never asked you that!” I felt my voice rise again and forced myself to calm down. He had a way of making me lose control. Sometimes it could be good, very good indeed, especially if we were together in bed. But other times, like now, I just really wanted to hit him. “Never mind,” I finally replied before leaving the room.
“You’re such a dickhead.”
Noah glared back at me and quickly left the room.
“That went well.” Kade’s eyebrows rose.
“Shut up,” I snapped back. Rubbing my tired eyes, I sat down in a corner of the dressing-room. Fuck, fuck, fuck. I could never get anything right!
“What’s going on?”
“Nothing that concerns you, Kade.”
“It does if it has an impact on Noah’s performance.”
I laughed, the sound sharp and brittle. “Do you really think this is going to affect him? You know him better than that surely.”
He sighed, his hand grabbing mine. “Why do you stay with him?”
“I don’t know.”
He nudged my chin with his free hand and our gazes locked. I felt my eyes widen at the intensity in his. Uh oh. Time to run.
I tugged my hand free, jumped up from my chair and ran out of the room.
This wasn’t good.
It’d taken me a while but I’d finally understood why I was still in this situation.
Why, even if Noah was driving me nuttier by the minute, I was still sharing his room.
The ex-girlfriend who didn’t want to cut free.
It was pathetic.
And it was all his fault.
Chapter One
“Do you really think I can’t see what’s happening?”
“Uh?” I looked up from my book. I was sitting against the headboard, Noah sprawled at the end of the bed as he played some kind of video game. “What?”
His eyes never leaving the plasma screen in front of him, he said, “I see the way he looks at you.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t lie to me, baby. I know you better than anyone else on this tour.”
“Considering we were together for six months, I sure hope so,” I commented before focusing on my book once again.
“I won’t hold it against you.”
That was it. I sighed and dropped the book onto the bedspread next to me. “What the hell does that mean?”
He pressed ‘pause’ on his joystick and turned around to face me. “If you want to fuck him,” he licked his lips and added, “I won’t mind.”
I gasped but remained silent for a moment, unable to find a suitable response.
“You’re joking, right?”
He shook his head. “Nope. I can see he wants you. And we’re not together anymore after all.”
“You wouldn’t mind if I had sex with Kade?” I was past incredulous.
“Nope. It’s your life.”
I looked at him, taking in the boy I’d come to love and hate. He appeared unfazed, making me realize he’d obviously thought about this. “I don’t get it.” I really didn’t.
“What’s not to get? You want him, right?” He didn’t even wait for my approval before he added, “Why don’t you go see if he’s in his room?”
“Now?”
“Sure.” He looked at what I was wearing. “Just change your clothes first. Wear something sexy. And put on some make-up-he likes make-up.”
I blinked. This was just too weird. Why was Noah pushing me into his friend’s bed all of a sudden? And why in hell wasn’t he at least a little bit jealous? “You don’t seem to mind.”
He shrugged. “I told you. We’re over. You can do whatever you want with whomever you want.”
“Even Kade.”
“Yup.”
That’s when I realized something else. If I slept with Kade, Noah would be able to sleep with whomever he wanted too.
Of course.
God, I really was stupid.
He just wanted to be free to screw a groupie or two with no guilt.
And just because I wanted to make his life difficult, I’d ignored his advice and gone back to my book. He’d growled a few times, made a few scathing remarks but I’d kept on ignoring him and he’d grown bored of it after a while.
I’d turned the lights off an hour or so later and climbed into bed. He’d joined me some time during the night, his body nearly touching mine.
I knew what he wanted. After that fateful day, when he’d decided we were over, we’d tried going cold turkey. Except that doing nothing after so many months making love several times a day had proved too much-for the both of us.
So here I was, still hanging on. Still in his bed.
It was torture being with Noah like this. Because a part of me still loved him. The part he hadn’t crushed when he’d told me all those things. How I wasn’t enough. That it wasn’t fun anymore. That he wanted something else from his life.
I had yelled and screamed and cried. It had changed nothing.
So why was I still here?
I turned around and snuggled against his side. His hand drifted under my shirt and palmed my breast. My back arched and I moaned when his fingers pulled on a hardened nipple. I just wasn’t sure anymore if it was a good thing or not that he knew me so well, knew what to do to arouse me with just a few caresses.
Fingers slid down my stomach and I opened my legs, eager to feel his touch. I was already wet, partly because I’d been waiting for this, partly because of the book I’d just read. Everyone kept making fun of my taste in books but I needed a little romance in my life. Okay, so the love scenes were great too.
His thumb pressed against my clit, my hips jerking up at the sudden caress.
“Noah!”
He chuckled, one long finger drifting further down until it entered me. He pumped it a few times, the thrusts too shallow to make me come but they were enough to make me start panting.
