Page 44 of The Forbidden Trio

“You and I know that, but my dad will never see anything other than how he wants to see it. I went out there after I got clean and tried to make my amends. He didn’t really say much, though. I know it hurt him, in his own way, anyway, for me to lose my shit so publicly. I tried to make things right. A few times. He didn’t want to talk about it, so I never got very far with him. My sponsor has tried to help me get some closure on that myself because sometimes you have to let it go. I had to realize that I don’t have any control over other people. But my dad… He’s more comfortable when he has someone to blame, I guess. Someone other than my mom, who actually

might deserve it.” He paused. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to get morose.”

She shrugged. “Family will do that every time.”

“Except yours. Your family is a rare thing, Janie—which never surprised me.You’rea rare thing.”

She was. Lovely and sweet, and he’d been a total dick to have ever done anything to jeopardize what they had. He’d be damned if he wouldn’t make it up to her now.

“I got lucky. I know most people don’t have even one person in their family they get along with, never mind all of them. But you have your brother. How is he?”

“Chase? He’s happy as hell. He’s playing his guitar, we’re traveling the world, women throw themselves at his feet—not that that’s anything new. We just got back from a long tour, and we’re almost done laying down a new album. He moved into this great house in Venice on the canals last month. He can walk right down to the beach with his surfboard—he’s in heaven.”

“And Jaden?” she asked.

“Jaden is Jaden.” He laughed. “Still giving me shit every chance he gets. Still one of the best drummers out there. I’m lucky he’s hung in there through… everything, you know? Chase is my

brother so he’s kind of stuck with me, but Jaden didn’t have to stay.”

“He’s a good guy. I always liked him.”

“Yeah, he is. Ryan’s a good guy too, even if he keeps to himself more than the rest of us.”

She nodded, quiet for a moment, staring into her bowl once more. It was difficult for her to think about Ink & Iron’s bass player, he knew—the one who had replaced Sonny when he was kicked out of the band for his drug abuse.

“I know it’s rough, Janie,” he said quietly, rubbing a hand over her shoulder, twisting his fingers in her hair.

“It’s just… any reminder…”

“Yeah. It’s hard for me too.”

“Is it?” she asked, the tears glimmering in her eyes. “The band survived your addiction, Cole. Maybe if you’d let Sonny stay…” She shook her head when he winced. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. I don’t know.”

“But you do know, baby. You understood before I did. You had to walk away from me, and Igotit, even though I never wanted you to leave. When I got clean… We had to let him go. If you take a minute to think about it, I know you can understand that we had no choice with Sonny. He couldn’t make it through a set. Couldn’t play. He was a wreck. And it was wrecking the rest of us. He was too much of a liability. He was always drinking, always had drugs on him. He surrounded himself with those people—it was sex and drugs and rock ’n’ roll, until all that was left was the drugs. I had to make sure I didn’t allow that kind of temptation in my face. I couldn’t let his disease take me back down that path.”

She bit her lip. “I guess I do understand. But my mind keeps trying to come up with different scenarios, as if that’s going to change anything. Bring him back to life. It’s stupid, I know.”

He stroked her hair from her cheek, wiping a stray tear away. “It’s not stupid,” he said, keeping his tone low. “It isn’t anything the rest of us haven’t thought ourselves, believe me. It’s what we do when we lose someone. I spend a lot of time trying to imagine how it might have gone differently. A lot of damn time, Janie.”

He looked into her eyes. He wasn’t just talking about losing Sonny anymore.

“Cole?” She took his hand and held it to her chest, her skin warming him. “Is this how you felt after I left you? I was so angry and disappointed. And yet… a small part of me sort of hoped your pills and your alcohol kept you numb enough that you didn’t hurt too much. Did you hurt? Did you notice?”

Her words broke his heart. “Ah, baby. I fucking hurt—I’ll never be able to tell you how much. That’s all I really remember about that time, and for a long time after. It wasn’t until I got sober a year later that I really faced my pain, though. What happened with you. Shit about my dad. About my mom. The way she left us when we were kids. The fact that she was an alcoholic, and how that did a lot to fuel my own substance abuse issues.”

His chest still ached a little when he thought about her. He didn’t want to think about his mother. Not right now.

“Change of subject?”

Her gaze softened, and he knew she understood. He’d never really told her much about his mother, and she’d simply accepted that he couldn’t talk about it. Maybe someday. But right now, he needed to feel her.

“Put your noodles down and come over here, woman.”

Chapter Five

She smiled as she put the tray on the nightstand, then she sat in his lap, her gorgeous, naked body curled against him.

“Janie.”

---