Tainted Butterfly by Terri Anne Browning
I shrugged. “I think Caleb is coming too.”
“Kin’s stepbrother is going to be there?”
“Maybe?” I used my towel to wipe the sweat on his brow. “I’m going to shower and grab a cab to the restaurant.”
“No, you’re not.”
I blinked up at him at his hard tone. “Um, yes, I am. I told you the plan last night and again when we got here. And I wasn’t asking your permission anyway.”
“I meant, no, I don’t want you to take a cab.” He bent and picked up his gym bag, which was beside the weight bench. “I’ll take you.”
“But I don’t want to mess up your workout. Really, I’ll be fine taking a cab.”
“I don’t like the idea of you in a cab by yourself. It’s not safe.” He put a hand at the small of my back and urged me toward the locker rooms.
“You think nothing is safe when it comes to me,” I complained, stopping outside the women’s locker room. “You have to stop acting like you’re responsible for me. I’m a big girl now, Gray. I can take care of myself just fine.”
He cupped my jaw in one hand. “Little butterfly, I will always feel responsible for you. You’re too precious to me not to.”
“Maybe, but I still think you have serious control issues,” I grumbled.
“Probably,” he agreed with a smirk.
“Fine. Thanks for taking time out of your day to drive me. You can come back after you drop me off though. I’ll get a ride home with one of the others.”
“Nah, I’ll just stay and eat lunch with you,” he said as he went into the men’s locker room.
Kin was not going to be happy with him hanging around, but I wasn’t about to tell him no. Not when I wanted him there with me.
Nearly an hour later, he pulled up in front of the restaurant and let the valet take his car. Everyone else had already arrived, so the hostess took us straight back to our table. Gray wasn’t the only addition to what was supposed to be just a girls’ lunch. Harris Cutter was there with Lucy, and Jace had come as well. Jenna Stevenson had also tagged along with Angie, and it was beside her that I took a seat, with Caleb on my other side.
“You’re late,” Kin chided before giving Gray a reproachful glare. “And you weren’t invited.”
“Pretend I’m not here. You’re good at that.” He waited for the waiter to bring an extra chair, but when he started to place it between Harris and Angie, he took it from the guy and set it between me and Caleb. “What’s up, man?” he greeted Caleb.
Gray and Caleb got along because they had at least one thing in common: weightlifting. Caleb was huge, like World’s Strongest Man huge. It was a running joke among everyone that he bench-pressed small cars for fun, but I couldn’t help but wonder if maybe it held a little truth to it. For all of his muscle, however, he seemed like a gentle giant. His twin, who was in every way his exact opposite, had enough of a temper for the two of them.
Angie leaned across Jenna to whisper, “Why did you have to bring the douche noodle?”
“He wouldn’t let me take a cab by myself,” I explained, picking my water glass up.
“Oh yeah, because you’re six and need him to hold your hand to cross the street and all.” Angie rolled her eyes. “Maybe he should adopt you.”
“Leave her alone, Ang,” Jenna admonished. “It’s nice having someone look out for you, and that’s all Gray is doing.”
Yeah, my inner bitch said in that snide voice I hated so damn much. He’s just looking out for his best friend. Because that is all you will ever be to him.
Gray
I set my empty bottle of beer on the bar and picked the fresh one up. Swallowing half of it, I turned to face Sin and Kale, who were beside me. For the first time in weeks, they both had the same night off. We all needed a night out, just drinking and hanging out like old times.
Sin’s gaze was on a group of chicks sitting in a booth across the bar.
Kale’s eyes followed his. “Eight of them, three of us. That should make this a fun night.”
I glanced at the group. With the way they kept looking over at us and giggling, all of them seemed hyper and horny as fuck. There were two brunettes and a redhead, but the rest were blond, all of them dressed for a night of fucking and fun. But I wasn’t interested. The thought of spending the night with one or more of any of them bored me.
All I wanted was to drink a few beers, hang with my friends, and then go home.
To Kassa.
I turned back to the bartender. “I’ll take another,” I told him before finishing off my second beer.
Sin and Kale both let out hard sighs behind me.
“You’re not gonna come have fun with us?” Sin asked, but he already knew the answer.
“Nope,” I answered anyway. “Not in the mood.”
For once, Kale didn’t make a smartass joke about it. “Tell Kas I said hi,” he said as he picked his fresh beer up and headed straight for the booth of girls.
Sin grabbed his drink. “Sorry, bro. But I just want to get drunk and laid. See you later.”
I frowned after them, not because I was pissed they were leaving me to score pussy. I couldn’t have cared less. I didn’t need those shitheads to have a good time. It was because I hadn’t been in the mood to score like they were doing in weeks. Ever since Kassa had come back with me, I hadn’t gone looking for a hookup once. I hadn’t fucked around or even wanted to fuck around.
I was perfectly happy not scoring a new chick every night, because when I was out without Kassa, all I thought about—all I wanted—was to get home and be with her. If I wasn’t hanging out with my friends, I was with her. I wasn’t bored like I had thought I might be, and that only confused the hell out of me.
Was this what it felt like when you were in love with someone? This empty feeling when Kassa wasn’t with me? The contentment when she was right beside me? The peace when she smiled at me or cuddled in close to me at night when I slept in the same bed with her?
I didn’t know, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. What if what I was feeling was because I was in love with Kassa? What would happen if I changed my mind and gave in to what we were both feeling but I still ended up hurting her?
I didn’t want to know, didn’t want to think about losing her if that happened.
I finished my third beer in two drinks and tossed a few bills beside my empty bottle before heading out. Sin and Kale didn’t even notice when I left, already lost in the group of chicks as they giggled and flirted with them.
Outside, I grabbed a cab and headed home. It was just after midnight, and Jace wasn’t home. He was either spending the night at Kin’s or still out with her at First Bass. The apartment seemed empty when I opened the door, but Kassa’s door was slightly ajar, and when I glanced inside, she was tucked under the covers with the TV on.
I didn’t even hesitate to enter her bedroom. After kicking my shoes off, I took off my shirt, my jeans, and my socks before climbing into bed beside her. She barely stirred as I shifted her over and pulled the covers up over myself before wrapping my arm around her and tucking her close.
“Love you, Kas.”
“Hmm?” Her eyes fluttered open for a few seconds before closing. “Love you,” she mumbled sleepily.
“I love you, Kassa.” I tried the words out, just to see how it would feel, but there wasn’t anything different about saying the words.
Except … maybe that was because I had fallen for her a long time ago.
I just hadn’t let myself admit it.
TWENTY TWO
Gray
Gray age 24
Kassa age 19
The feel of a warm body squirming beside me had my eyes snapping open. It took two seconds for me to realize that I wasn’t in my own bed, but in Kassa’s. Her body was tangled around mine, her legs twisted between my own and her hand tucked between us as she used my chest as her pillow.
I didn’t remember climbing into bed with her. Fuck, I wasn’t even sure I remembered getting
She sighed softly and squirmed against me again, trying to find a more comfortable position, which only had me increasingly more uncomfortable from the waist down. Fuck, but I was hard as a damn rock. Which was just one more thing I had gotten used to in the time she had been living with me and Jace. I seemed to be constantly in a state of full hard-on, twenty-four-seven because of her.
My arm tightened around her and I turned us onto our sides, letting her pillow her head on my bicep, which made it easier for me to hide the powerful effect she had on my cock. Her hair fell over my arm and across her pillow, giving me a perfect view of her beautiful face, which was soft with sleep. And I couldn’t help but think about the past year.
As she had promised, things hadn’t changed between us—at least not on her part. After the initial bumps in the road, we had fallen back into our old relationship. I was pretty sure my friends and her brother were happy about that, because Kassa was the only one who could handle me when I got moody. Which, according to Kin, happened daily.
At first, I had liked that we could be the same old Gray and Kassa, had appreciated that it was hard for her and cherished our friendship even more because I knew how hard it was for her to put everything behind her and fall back into the role of just friends. But, over time, things had changed between us—or maybe I had changed. I didn’t want to think about it, but it was true. I hadn’t fucked around this past year like I once had. I went out with my friends, got drunk every now and then, but I came home every night.
Alone.
Every morning, I woke up with Kassa beside me, come rain or shine. She had complained the week before that it was becoming a habit, sounding annoyed, but I could tell she was just blowing off steam at me. I hadn’t wanted to get into it with her, mostly for fear that she would stop letting me into her bed at night, but the truth was I didn’t enjoy getting to open my eyes to find her tucked in close to me because of a damn habit. I liked it because it felt right. If things changed tomorrow and I didn’t get to wake up to her hogging the covers or pressing her cold feet to my thighs, it would wreck me.
“Why are you staring at me like that?” she grumbled, still half-asleep.
“Because you’re beautiful,” I told her honestly, mentally arguing with myself over the reasons why I couldn’t kiss her full, ripe bottom lip or let my fingers ease between her silky, soft legs to see if she was just as turned on at having me beside her like this as I was.
“Liar,” she said with a soft laugh before yawning and turning so that her back was to me.
Her sweet ass burrowed back into my lower body, and I knew she wasn’t blind to the fact that I had a raging hard-on. Yet she didn’t comment on it or even act like she felt it when it flexed against the seam of her ass through her thin layers of cotton sleep shorts and my boxers, the only thing I was wearing.
“Go back to sleep or get out of my bed,” she said. “I’m still sleepy.”
I was a glutton for punishment, because I stayed right where I was, savoring this moment with her even as my cock begged me to stake my claim and sink between her thighs, where I belonged. Instead, I ignored the constant ache and the heaviness of my balls and buried my face in her hair. I inhaled deep the scent of her mint and raspberry shampoo and closed my eyes as my hands locked together over her belly button.
She gave an exasperated sigh, but when I lifted my head to glance at her face, she was smiling. I kissed her cheek and then laid my head back on the pillow, which had begun to smell of me because I had used it so often lately. Soon, she was drifting back to sleep, but I was wide awake and my body was begging for something I had denied for over a year now.
I stayed there, holding her like that, for nearly two hours before her phone got an incoming text, which disturbed my own slice of heaven. I lifted my head to glare at her phone, which was sitting on the nightstand, wishing whoever was messaging her to the darkest parts of hell. It could have been any number of people wanting to talk to her. Kin or Angie or even Lucy Thornton came to mind first. They seemed to constantly be hanging out, and I liked that they all got along. Kassa deserved good friends—chick friends.
Guy friends, I could have done without her having, but it seemed like she was just as close to Nate as she was to Kin these days. She hung out with the bartender at least once a week, which irritated the fuck out of me. There had been times when all I’d wanted to do was put my fist through the guy’s face, but Kassa had warned me off him. Repeatedly. I was starting to tolerate ol’ Nate though, even like him a little, because he hadn’t tried to put the moves on my little caterpillar.
That motherfucker, Travis Braxton, on the other hand, was going to taste his own teeth if he kept trying to touch her whenever he was around her.
I gritted my teeth, thinking of the road manager Emmie had put in charge of the tour Tainted Knights was about to head out on the following week. The day before, he had been about ten seconds away from having my fist reshaping his face while we had been doing that boring-ass photo shoot. I got territorial as hell whenever that little douchebag was around, and while I knew I didn’t have the right, that didn’t really matter.
The first text was quickly followed by another, and Kassa groaned as she blindly reached for the phone. Pulling it down to her face, she peeked at the screen for a few seconds while I tried to read over her shoulder.
Be there shortly for the band meeting.
My hands tightened around Kassa’s waist, making her give a small mewl in protest. I quickly eased my hold up and snatched the phone from her hands. “I don’t like that fucker texting you.”
She took her phone back, giving me a glare as she sent a quick reply back to Travis. “He’s only doing his job, Gray. And, since none of you seem to answer when he calls or texts any of you, I’m the one he has to relay messages to.” She tossed her phone back on the nightstand before slapping at my hand, which was still firmly locked around her waist.
I reluctantly released her as she got out of bed and started for the bathroom.
“Get dressed, lazy,” she told me. “He’s going to be here in less than half an hour.”
I stayed where I was, watching the sway of her hips with each step she took. “I don’t like the way he looks at you,” I called after her. She had left the bathroom door half open, so I knew she could hear me. “You should stop leading him on.”
She laughed, but it sounded anything but amused. “I don’t lead him—or anyone else—on,” she assured me, standing in the doorway, her toothbrush in hand. “I’m just friendly.”
“Which he thinks is flirting,” I pointed out, ignoring the shot about “anyone else” because I knew that it was aimed at me, and got an eye roll from her in return. “I don’t like it, Kassa.”
“It’s not any of your business who I do or don’t flirt with. We’re friends, Gray, but I don’t belong to you.” With that, she nudged the door closed, and I heard the distinct sound of it locking.
I fell back onto the bed, scrubbing my hands over my face. Whether she wanted to admit it or not, we both knew she was wrong. Kassa belonged to me, just as I belonged to her. It had taken me a year—fuck, a year—but I was finally letting it sink in that, no matter how much I wanted to keep our relationship the same, that wasn’t going to happen. I wanted more—had always wanted more—but I had been too much of a chickenshit to let myself admit it.
I had dropped hint after hint to her that I wanted to finally see where we could go, because if nothing else, this past year had shown me what a relationship with her could be like—minus the sex. But she had been ignoring every single one of them. Whether it was on purpose or not, I had no fucking clue, but I suspected she was trying to punish me for having rejected the whole idea of being more tha
I was still lying there when she came out of the bathroom twenty minutes later, a towel wrapped around her wet body as she used another to dry her hair. My cock stood to attention, and there was no way she could have not seen the way my body had instantly reacted to the sight of her in nothing but a few drops of water and a thin, white towel that didn’t completely cover her perfect ass.
Ignoring my cock, which was practically waving at her, she gave an exasperated sigh and walked into her closet. “Maybe you don’t remember the way to your own room—you sleep in here so much these days. It’s through that door and across the hall. Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.”
Blowing out a hard sigh, I repositioned my cock and pushed myself up and out of bed. Reluctantly, I left her room, not wanting to start an argument with her. In the past few weeks, it seemed like we argued at least once a day. She was usually the one starting them, although I had started it once or twice lately. The chick was so maddening, but it only made me want her more, damn it. I liked when her fiery side came out, and fuck, but it really came out when we were arguing about stupid shit.
In my own room, I pulled on a pair of sweats and a T-shirt before brushing my teeth. The doorbell rang as I was rinsing my mouth, and Kassa’s bedroom door shut as she left her room, so I hurried to follow after her.
In the living room, Kale had apparently already been there for a while with Cash and Sin. Jace let Travis in and took the chair Kassa had already plopped down on the arm of, a notebook in her hand so she could take notes on the schedule Travis was supposed to go over with us for the following week.
We left for our first tour on Sunday, and I was thankful as fuck that Kassa had finally given in and agreed to go with us. If she had stayed home, I would have done nothing but worried about her for the next nine weeks. No fucking way could I have handled being away from her for that long. Hell, I couldn’t go an entire day without seeing her or I got edgy. More than two months would have probably had my bandmates murdering me in my sleep.