Blessed Fate (19 page)

"I need you to talk to Tanya," I said, leaning against the railing staring out at the water.

I heard Jon's Zippo flip open and knew he was lighting up. He didn't smoke often, but always carried a pack with him for when he was stressed. He said it was his insurance policy to keep him out of prison for killing someone. "What's going on? She still trying to hook up? I warned you to stay away from her, dammit." Jon turned to mimic my posture. We stood in silence while I put together my thoughts.

"No, it's not like that. She called the other day; knew about Rain and I getting together. Hell, she knew about Rain going home. I thought we were keeping that under wraps so she could have some privacy." Even though it had been a few days, I couldn't stop wondering how she had managed to find out about that since Jon was still sleeping when she had called me.

"I'll talk to her. Dammit man, out of all the pussy you have available to you, why in the hell did you go after that one?" Jon shook his head like a disappointed father. "She's hanging off the edge of crazy, which would have been enough to keep most guys away. But add in that she's damn good at her job, and now we're all in this position...not good, buddy."

My phone went off, alerting me to a new message. "What the fuck," I mumbled as I stared at the picture in front of me.

"Everything okay?" I felt Jon standing behind me, trying to see what caused such a reaction. "Uh, wow." He seemed to be as much at a loss for words as I was.

We knew that it was Rain staring back at us from the photo, but only because we knew her so well. Her red hair, which had become somewhat of a signature feature for her, was gone, along with the bouncy curls. Her new look was smokin' hot with long, almost black hair with blue peeking out from the lower layers.

"What's up with her eyes?" Jon asked, reaching for the phone so he could take a closer look. Thrown so much by the hair, I didn't notice the absence of the bright green eyes I had become accustomed to over the years.

"She's not wearing her colored contacts." I had seen her natural, honey colored eyes a number of times, typically early in the morning before she put in her contacts, but not frequently enough to really appreciate them. They were a haunting contrast to her new dark hair.

"Damn, she looks hot." Jon whistled, taking another long look at her picture. If it had been anyone else, I would have been upset, but I knew Jon saw her like a little sister. "Good thing you snagged her when you did. She's now officially out of your league."

He was right, but part of me felt like she was out of my league before the makeover as well. I sat there staring at her picture, still trying to convince myself it wasn't a dream that she was mine. Seeing as she had run out before I woke up the morning after we had finally made love for the first time, that wasn't an easy feat.

"Come on, Romeo, let's go get some dinner." I shoved the phone back in my pocket and grabbed the keys for my dad's Audi Q7 off the counter.

Jon and Travis took me out to a local sports bar, hoping beer and a few friendly games of pool would shake me out of my funk. The concept of being in a relationship was so far off either of their radars that they thought I was a freak because I couldn't stop thinking about mine. Just about the time I was starting to forget about Rain, or at least not feel like my mind was being consumed by thoughts of her, my phone buzzed against my hip.

Shoot me. Mike has me at the bar. Convinced me to do karaoke.

It shocked me a little that she was at a bar, especially with her brother. She had threatened to stay inside the entire time she was home after pictures of her started appearing online yesterday morning, and to be out with her brother…that was huge. I was happy to see they were starting to get along and wished I were there.

Me: LOL, have fun with that. Whatcha singin?

Rain: That's the best part. He is picking.

Me: Want video.

Rain: Not fucking likely. Well, knowing people around here, Google it in a few hours, I'm sure it'll be posted.

Little did she know that was exactly what I planned to do. Knowing the assholes back there, I had no doubt it would be online if they recognized her.

Me: More problems?

Rain: Just the pic from yesterday. Wish they'd let me be.

Me: How's dad?

Rain: Not sure yet. Talked to Mike tonight, tell you about it later.

That didn't sound good. I wished I could have been sitting next to her, supporting her and her entire family as they went through the ups and downs of life.

Me: Okay. Btw, you know Tanya's gonna kick your ass over the hair, right?

Rain: Yep.

Me: I think it's hot.

Rain: Good. Because you know everything I do is done to make you think I'm hot.

Me: You could wear a burlap sack and I'd still think you're hot.

Rain: Too itchy. Mike's apparently picked, gotta run. Ttys.

"You really are turning into a teenage girl, aren't you?" Jon laughed as I put my phone away.

"Huh?"

He reached into my pocket, unlocking my phone to see what we had been saying. Yeah, it was a punk move, but Jon knew he could get away with it. We were close enough I couldn't imagine a time when I'd hide anything from him and he was just trying to give me a hard time as always.

"Oh hell no, she's doing karaoke? Tanya's gonna shit a brick by the time Rain flies back down here if she keeps it up." Jon shook his head. "Have you warned her that Tanya seems to have a vendetta against her?"

I nearly choked on my beer at his question. "And how do you propose I tell her that without telling her everything?" I asked, steepling my fingers under my chin. "You know she's going to want to know why."

"What can she say? What happened between you two was before Rain got her shit together."

I stared at Jon, wide-eyed. "Have you met Rain? Just because she technically doesn't have anything to say doesn't mean she won't have anything to say."

Some of the road crew joining us cut our conversation short. Almost everyone had gone home for the short break, but a few who were single opted to chip in and rent an extended stay suite. They had worked their asses off on tour, and I couldn't blame them for wanting a break.

It was nice to have some downtime really getting to know the people responsible for making sure we were ready to go on stage every night. By the time the bar closed, we had all had more than our fair share to drink, with the exception of Angie, the only female on our crew. She offered to drive us home, and we gladly accepted. Everyone piled into the SUV, and we moved the party back to the beach house.

That's where we found out that Jared, one of the guitar techs, was a fucking genius on the piano. What started with everyone throwing out drunken requests and him knowing how to play just about every song under the sun turned into Jon challenging him to keep up in a duel. From there, I pulled out my guitar, Travis got his bass guitar and we were suddenly having a jam session at five in the morning, drunk off our asses.

In my head, getting my piercing the day Rain left was perfect. Get it done. Heal while she was gone. Have fun when she got home. I probably should have told her about it at some point, but how do you start that conversation? "Hey, so while you were gone, I went and got my cock pierced. Trust me; you're going to love it." For some reason, I couldn't see having that talk over the phone.

Unfortunately, this decision wound up being like so many I had made in my life, much better in theory than in execution. The night before Rain flew home, I sat in bed trying to figure out how I was going to break it to her that we weren't going to spend the entire day in bed like she had been threatening for the past few days.

We had been up all night working on finishing touches on a few new songs when I heard the front door open. In the faint reflection of the window, I saw that it was Rain trying to sneak in. When she heard Jared and Jon working on a kick ass break, she stopped dead in her tracks. I couldn't blame her; they were awesome together. I used the distraction to sneak out of the house, back around to the front door.

"Pretty good, isn't it?" I wrapped my arms around her waist as I whispered in her ear.

Without saying a word, Rain turned in my arms and planted her lips firmly against mine. Her lips parted, her gentle tongue tracing my lower lip before pressing deep inside my mouth. I pulled away from the kiss tracing my finger along her cheek, taking in her new look. In pictures, the dark hair combined with her naturally amber eyes was beautiful. Standing in front of me, she was hauntingly gorgeous.

"Upstairs," she pleaded, pulling on my hand. I knew what she wanted and wasn't ready to tell her that would have to wait. I could have kicked myself, not realizing that the healing process would take so long. I had gone for the piercing while she was gone so I wouldn't have to waste a minute I could be spending with her and here I was having to do just that.

"No time, my little cloud." I pulled her towards the living room to show her the newest addition to the band. While he wasn't an official, full-time member of the band, we had made the decision to add Jared on a limited basis to the summer tour. The boy had talent that we couldn't deny and he added another layer of depth to our sound that we needed.

When Rain jumped on my back wrapping her legs around my waist, I thought I was going to hit the floor. She managed to catch right in the wrong spot sending spikes of pain through my body.

"Come on, they weren't even expecting me for twelve more hours." I leaned my head away from her to try to keep her from biting my ear as we walked through the house. She knew what a turn-on that was for me and she was having fun trying to tempt me into a day hiding in our bedroom.

"Nope, you're just going to have to be patient. I know that's hard for you, but it'll be a good test." I needed to get her out of the house. That was the only way I would be able to resist her advances.

After carefully dropping Rain onto the couch, the guys finally noticed she was home. We spent the next hour catching her up on everything she had missed. We ran through some of the new material, told her where Jared fit into everything and gave her the quick version of the schedule for the summer.

The bottom of Rain's tank top slid up slightly as she leaned into my side on the couch. I knew I was playing with fire, but I needed to feel her skin on mine. I started tracing circles on her stomach, each one leading my hand a little further under the cotton. When I started nipping and kissing her neck, I felt her shift beneath me and knew I was tormenting her. "If you keep that up, all bets are off," she hissed.

I bolted from the couch as she reached behind her back hoping to rub against me to return what I was giving. "No time for that, come on." I grabbed her hand practically dragging her through the house to our room. I saw a twinkle in her eyes as we crossed the threshold, thinking I was teasing her. In reality, I knew I couldn't stay in the house with her another minute or I would cave.

"Get changed, we're going for a ride." If looks could kill, I am pretty sure I would have been a dead man just then. She wasn't happy at my latest suggestion.

"Well, if we have time for a ride..." her voice trailed off. I made the mistake of turning around to face her at the exact moment she slipped her tank top over her head, revealing her perfect, bare breasts. I sucked in a deep breath, reminding myself that I was out of commission as she hooked her thumbs under the waistband of her yoga pants. In one swift motion, she removed her pants and her panties, so she was standing before me completely naked.

She pressed that tight body against me, and I started re-thinking whether or not I could do this. Surely it would just be a bit tender at first, right? People did this all the time. She brushed her hands against the zipper of my jeans and I felt my cock twitch beneath her palm. It didn't exactly hurt, but it definitely wasn't comfortable. We needed to get out of the bedroom, the sooner, the better.

"Come on, I was going to take you out tonight, but since the guys are going to crash soon, we'll go now. That way, we can grab a nap before they're working on shit tonight and we won't miss anything."

"Is everything okay?" I could see the wheels turning in her head as she tried to find a different outfit to wear for the day. I wanted to tell her, couldn't figure out why I wasn't. I guess I was just a chicken-shit. It's not easy to admit to doing something that seemed so major without even talking to the other person impacted by my decision. If we couldn't talk about things like that, what would happen down the road when things that really mattered came up?

"Yep, fine."
No, everything's not okay. I'm a fucking coward. I'm a pansy who can't tell my girlfriend that I got my cock pierced while she was gone, and now she's probably thinking all sorts of crazy shit.