Page 21 of Revived

“Like you?” I asked.

Kendra just shrugged her shoulders. “You were always a wonderful man, Gabe. You deserve to find happiness and I think she’s right over there, waiting for you to realize.”

She might have a point, but I wasn’t sure if Mel would see it that way. Kendra wandered away from me after squeezing my bicep on the way. I felt like she was trying to encourage me to go for Mel, but I still wasn’t sure that was the best bet.

“Hey man!” John called out to me as he came out to the backyard too. That was my cue to turn around and make my bandmates follow me back into the house. I didn’t want them to see my woman – Mel – in her purple bathing suit. Damn Kendra for putting that thought in my head. She wasn’t my woman, but there was a part of me that wished she was. No matter what, most of my bandmates were just as single as I was and there was no way they were going to stand around watching the beautiful nurse waiting in her bathing suit to save my son if he needed saving.

“Let’s go,” I called when they hesitated to watch.

“Looking good,” John called out, but tacked on, “Chevy.” At the last minute while laughing his ass off as he followed me back inside.

“Dick,” I muttered. I had never been worried about John though, at least not where Mel was concerned. He was totally swept up in his wife, and after the problems they’d had recently, there was no way he would jeopardize that.

“I think a certain shade of purple is my new favorite color,” Alex tormented.

“Also a dick,” I murmured. My bandmates laughed at me as we moved through the house to the stairs that led to the basement where we were still setting up our own recording studio. I’d had a similar setup in my home in LA, but since I’d most likely be living in John’s Creek more than anywhere else from now on, I figured I would need it repeated here. The men in my band still all lived in California, but they had been kind enough to rally close by while Chevy was recuperating so that we could get work done and be near my son while he also remained close to his family.

“Kendra seems to have made herself at home here too,” Tim Whitehall, my band’s drummer, mentioned.

“Her son is here, and healing after a major accident. I gave her a key and the codes, so she has access whenever it’s needed.”

“Sure, there’s nothing going on there between you two? I saw the way she felt up your arm on the way to the pool,” Wen put in his two cents. “Looked like that nurse of yours took notice too.”

She had? Well, shit. That wasn’t the message I wanted to send her at all. I blew Wen off because my friend didn’t exactly have the best track record with women. He was currently split from his wife again while dating the lead singer of the all-female rock group Dusty Rose. Both of those relationships had been off and on for years because Wen didn’t know how to ditch his wife since she always threatened to take his daughter with her. He was truly in love with the rock goddess, Calista, though. The sad part was, he always chose Janet, the mother of his child, in the end and ran back to her every time she threatened to go hide their daughter away somewhere. It was a messy situation all around.

“She probably came over to hang out with Chevy and Mel,” I finally told them.

“So, she’s friends with the nurse then?” Wen asked. I nodded my response and he just chuckled. “Sounds like a crap situation waiting to happen. The ex can never be friends with the current,” he warned me.

“First of all, Mel isn’t my current anything. Secondly, why the fuck not?” I snapped. “I don’t mind Hash being around,” I told him, as if to prove a point.

“Pretty sure his road name is Hex, and that just makes what I said even truer,” Wen laughed, and the rest of our band joined in because they were assholes.

“Seriously though, are you going after the nurse, because if not…” Alex started to ask. I cut a glare at him instead of answering right away. I knew the fucker had been interested. I’d caught him trying to chat her up a few times when Chevy had still been in the hospital and the guys came to visit.

“She’s off limits,” I demanded.

“Is that off limits to everyone, or everyone who isn’t you, Gabe?” Alex asked, and there was no mirth along with his words. He really wanted to know what my intentions were.

“This isn’t some celebrity dating game. She’s here to work, end of story,” I told him. Alex didn’t say another word, but I definitely saw the challenging gleam in his eyes. He would try my patience on this point. Kendra’s words from earlier came back to bite me in the ass. What if I waited too long to express interest and one of my bandmates ended up winning her over? Jesus, what a fucking mess that would be.

A couple hours later, when we were happy with the changes that needed to be made, and had fucked around with the music for the new song I’d written, we all went back upstairs to put together some stuff to throw on the grill. The minute I rounded the stairs, another conversation caught my attention.

“You should come over for dinner. It will be a change of scenery for you. I never had to deal with this side of Gabe’s life, so I can’t imagine how frustrating it must feel to be a prisoner in his home thanks to his crazy fans,” Kendra was saying to Mel. My son noticed us coming up and smirked at me but didn’t let on that we were there.

“I don’t know,” Mel hedged. “I don’t want to intrude on your family time.”

“Nonsense,” Kendra waved away her objections. That was when I stepped into sight and shut my ex-girlfriend down.

“We were just about to get things ready to cook out on the grill,” I told them. “You’re more than welcome to have the rest of the family come over and join us,” I told Kendra, making it clear that we would all be dining here. Then I turned to Mel, whose cheeks had reddened. She didn’t stick around to hear anymore though. Instead, she tucked her towel around her ample chest and glanced back toward my son.

“I’ll be upstairs if you need me. I have some things to take care of and might take a nap. Just text or Facetime me, if you need me. Okay?”

“What about dinner?” My son asked her.

“Oh, I’m not really that hungry,” she told him and everyone present could see that was a lie. Once she was out of hearing range, Kendra turned narrowed eyes on me.

“That was rude,” she murmured. “I was trying to get her out of the house for a little while. It’s been weeks since she’s been anywhere other than this house. That’s not okay, Gabe.”

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