EIGHTEEN

MEETING UP WITH FRIENDS

Pandora

My morning text two days later isn’t actually from Melanie: it’s from Brooke.

Brooke: Are you in New Orleans? I just heard Crack Bikini’s concert was the night before last.

Me: Yes. We’re leaving today for Jacksonville to stop for the night and then on to the next stop.

Brooke: OMG we’re leaving Miami today! Do you want to meet up?

“Kenna.” I head into the shower and stop when I see him inside the stall, soaping up his beautiful body. I wait for him to turn the water off, and when he steps out, my breath catches.

“Whatcha doing there, Pink?”

“Looking at you,” I say, not even shy about memorizing every wet, delicious inch of the eye candy that is Mackenna Jones.

“Anything you like?”

“Most of it, yes.”

“Most of it?” He scowls. “Well, what don’t you like?”

“That I don’t know what that means.” I motion at his tattoo, and he glances down at it with a scowl.

“I told you. It means I’m a jackass.”

“And a cocky, self-confident man who thinks he’s God would tattoo that on his arm? Pfft! Keep lying to me, Kenna.”

I shake my head in chastisement, but he just smirks and says nothing—like he’d rather die than tell me. Then I sigh and explain, “One of my friends, her husband’s a fighter and they tour all the time, and they just finished in Miami. She asked if we could meet up in Jacksonville.”

“What kind of fighter?”

“I don’t know. But the fights get dirty.”

“What’s his name?”

“Riptide.”

“Whoa. Parents hate him?”

“I think they did, but no, that’s not his name. His real name is Remington Tate.”

“Seriously? Well, who’s your friend?”

“Brooke.”

“He was a boxer, no? Got kicked out when he went Tyson on some dudes at a bar or some shit? I like him.” He grins.

“You like all men who make you feel like you’re a saint next to them.”

He grins. “So, you asking me to double-date with you and your friend?”

“Ugh. It’s not a date. Forget it.”

He laughs. “Where do we meet them?”

I stare at my phone. My stomach tangles because it feels so serious. A date. Double-dating. Me and Mackenna, Brooke and Remy. But I want to see Brooke. I haven’t seen her in months, and she, Melanie, and Kyle are my only true friends.

Me: We’re on! How about dinner?

Brooke: Double date? OH YES! Text me when you get in town and we’ll have a reservation ready.

Me: It’s not a date, so please don’t say that in front of Mackenna.

Brooke: Holy shit, dinner with MJ from Crack Bikini. Remy doesn’t believe me.

Me: Why?

Brooke: He listens to their shit all the time before he fights!

Me: Well Mackenna already confessed his man-crush on Remington going Tyson in the past so if Mackenna wants to date someone, he can date Remy.

Brooke: Sorry, my man’s taken. :)

Me: You’re such a possessive bitch now.

Brooke: He actually loves it! So we’re on. See you tonight!

“We’re on,” I tell Mackenna. “But it’s not a date.”

We talk about them on our drive to Jacksonville. Having returned the bike, Mackenna is now driving a Porsche, and my seat is so sunken I can hardly see the road. It must have been too much to expect him to be monogamous with his car selection.

“And your other friend—Barbie?”

“Barbie lives with, and is marrying, the closest thing to sin that she could find.”

“And this sin likes her?”

“Are you kidding me? He dotes on her. He’d break any one of the ten commandments for her—hell, I’m sure he already has.”

“Wouldn’t any guy do that for their girl? Do whatever it takes to make sure she’s well and happy?”

I look at him in confusion. Because, hello? I used to be his girl. And when he walked away, he couldn’t have been stupid enough to think that it made me “well and happy.”

Unless he truly thought he wasn’t good enough for you. . . .

The thought haunts me as he finds a parking spot a block away from the restaurant, and it isn’t long before we spot Remy and Brooke, right outside. The first thing you see is, of course, him. He’s large and eye-catching, with muscles that make his T-shirt cling to his shoulders and biceps, and his narrow hips encased in low-slung jeans. His hair is spiky and rumpled—like Brooke’s just had her hands in it—and they’re deep in conversation, him nodding with a smile, his finger rubbing her bottom lip while she talks.

“Hey!” I call.

They turn and Brooke squeaks, “Pan!”

Remington approaches Mackenna with a dimpled smile. “I’ll be damned.”

“I’ll be next,” Mackenna says right back, and they strike handshakes, pumping hard and smiling while Brooke and I hug.

“How are you?”

“No, how are you? Touring with Crack Bikini!”

“Yeah, this is Mackenna,” I say, stepping back, gesturing. “Brooke, Mackenna. Mackenna, Brooke.”

“It’s so nice to meet you, Mackenna,” Brooke says sweetly, but even as she shakes Mackenna’s outstretched hand, she slips her free hand into Remington’s, as if reassuring him that he’s the one for her.

Remington looks down at her hand in his and smiles a secret smile. He doesn’t strike me as a man who needs constant reassurance, but the way he squeezes her hand in some silent communication makes me feel warm inside.

We head into the steakhouse, and the restaurant is oddly vacant as we walk inside. “Remington’s PA thought we’d have a better time if we rented out the place,” Brooke explains.

“Hell, I’m already having a blast,” Mackenna says, taking my hand in his.

It gives me tingles, and those tingles make me want to draw my hand away, but instead I find myself both scowling and laughing.

“I told you, this isn’t a date,” I whisper in his ear so only he can hear.

He turns his head and plants a quick, surprising kiss on my lips. One second his lips are on mine, shooting a gust of pleasure through my limbs, and the next they’re gone. “And I heard you the first time,” he says, smiling down at me.

He’s observing me with that rather adorable wolfish curiosity he always watches me with, and since it unsettles me so, I decide to concentrate on Brooke and Remington instead.

A waiter leads us to a table at the back of the restaurant, and I notice all those protective gestures they have. He steers her by the neck, while she uses the hand closest to him to hook her index finger into the waistband of his jeans. He pulls the chair out for her to sit, whispering something in her ear that makes her grin. When she laughs, he bends over. I watch as he rubs his nose all along the shell of her ear and she smiles privately at herself and closes her eyes. Shutting off the world so she can focus on what her husband is doing.

He sits down, and Mackenna, apparently immune to the fact that these two people are quietly making love to each other, begins by asking, “So how’d you get into these Underground fights?”

I’m amazed at how courteous Remington is, because he seems genuinely interested in Mackenna’s questions, his thick arm outstretched, one hand firmly on the back of Brooke’s chair. Her hand is under the table, and I think it’s on his thigh. I’m getting all sorts of hot feelings inside me, and an even more noticeable one that I always seem to feel when they are near. Longing. Because I ruined my chance at this.

That’s when, as Remington briefly explains to Mackenna that he’d fight wherever as long as he got to fight, I realize where Mackenna’s arm is. He’s in exactly the same position as Remington—his arm stretched across the back of my chair, his hand resting just behind my neck, as if he owns me.

Or, at least, thinks he does.

A tingle grows in my stomach, and I try unsuccessfully to quell it. I’ve always loved those little gestures I see between Brooke and her guy, but me? Oh, no. This is not for me. And definitely not for me and Kenna.

Okay, maybe a little part of me wants something like this, but not the rest of me.

I squirm, feeling uncomfortable. Then I slide my chair back a tad, just to see if he drops his hand.

He doesn’t.

In fact, he doesn’t even turn to look at me.

I hear Remington ask Mackenna, “How’d you get your start with the band?”

“Racer is so big,” I tell Brooke at last, switching the conversation to talk about her son while desperately trying to ignore Mackenna’s arm close to my nape.

Brooke grins and starts telling me Racer’s exact eating schedule, and how he’s restless because he’s just about ready to walk but can still barely stand up for a couple of seconds.

When the waiter approaches, Brooke doesn’t even pause, and I hear Remington order for her. She’s still talking to me when I hear Mackenna order, and just as I flip open my menu to decide what I’m having, I realize he’s also ordering for me. “She’ll have the mandarin salad and the seared scallops.”

Abruptly I leave Brooke midsentence and turn, rapping the side of his hard head. “Knock, knock?”