Page 38 of Play Dirty (Brooklyn Dawn 1)

Much as I hated them.

I lowered my gaze and forced my fingers to strum out a gentle chord even as my heart raced and my mind demanded a rough and dirty song. Sometimes pounding on the keys was the only thing that could cool the fever in my goddamn blood.

Lock it down.

“I like that.” Lindsey’s voice was friendly. As if I hadn’t taunted her into fleeing the room less than an hour before. She plucked the guitar out of the stand and folded herself onto the square of cushion cross-legged, settling the worn Taylor against her as if she’d done it a million times.

How many times had she played here? Sat here? Had they been cozying up like this for years now?

Maybe Bella simply didn’t care, although even my twisted brain couldn’t make that bit of insanity line up.

Even as my mind spun, Lindsey followed my rambling chords. The song hadn’t even had a real melody under it until we synced up. Then Logan followed suit until the three of us were playing as if we’d been doing it for years. She played without a pick, without any artifice. No fancy fingering or showing off.

She curled herself forward around the instrument, then suddenly looked up with a wide smile just before lyrics tumbled from her lips.

Over and over, she rehashed simple lines and refined them.

Logan flipped his phone onto the tray and pressed record before he joined her. They sang together effortlessly. He rearranged one of the verses and she nodded, thumping her hand against the body of the guitar as the song took a turn.

It went folksy and her voice dropped a few octaves. Husky and a near whisper, her words curled around Logan’s until they were a unit.

My throat tingled and the hint of something scratched at me. Dug at a place I didn’t think I still had available to me. Where a song lived.

Where words were locked up inside my hollow chest.

I stood and set my guitar down.

“Didn’t you like it?” She turned those huge blue eyes up at me.

“It was fine.” I cleared the huskiness out of my voice. It sounded too thick, too foreign. “Keep going.”

She frowned but turned to Logan. “From the top?”

He nodded.

I moved through the room to the kitchen. I could still hear them. Her range made my palms itch. I’d heard her songs on the radio. It was easy enough to push a button and silence her voice, but here it was in my face and there was no way to hide from it.

Or from her.

I was just as enamored as I’d been at the festival. When we’d sung together, I’d owed Logan a debt and I’d paid it. It had mangled my emotions and sent me into silence for months after it, but I’d done it. Because he was a friend and I owed him. The true problem was I’d enjoyed it.

And I didn’t deserve to enjoy anything, but especially music.

Not now. Not ever again.

But she made me want it. I craved the words and melodies tangled inside me almost as much as I craved her.

And that was dangerous.

I glanced at the farthest kitchen cabinet. I knew there was a whiskey bottle stashed there. It would be too easy to knock back a shot or two of liquid courage. To soothe the beast coming alive in my chest.

But that had been part of the penance. Denial was my life now. I’d embraced it.

Until Lindsey had shaken something loose inside me.

Exactly why I couldn’t afford to be here with them. And why I needed to get this over with.

I grabbed a cold water from the fridge and downed it, forcing the icy liquid over the rawness and scars of my throat. The tickle died and went back into hibernation where it belonged.

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