Page 48 of Give Me What I Want

“You good, baby?” he asked, his voice low, filled with some rough emotion that sadly wasn’t sounding anything like desire.

“Mhmm.” I nodded, closing my eyes and counting to five in my head, banishing inappropriate thoughts about what his music and hands did to my body. Now was not the time. “You good?” I asked once I had opened my eyes again, looking up at his face, focusing on his nose, not able to look up to his eyes, or down to his lips, or further to his shoulders, the huge muscles shifting in the most delicious way as he continued to play his guitar.

He dipped his head a little, forcing me to make eye contact with him. The green of his eyes a dark mossy colour, no jewelled sparkle in them today. The skin crinkled around the edges of his eyes as he gave a light laugh. “I’m fine. You look like you’re struggling though.”

I breathed a sigh of relief. “I’m fine,” I lied, then groaned, realising that fine was almost always a lie. He was lying too. “What do you need?” As much as I wanted to push him, I didn’t. I had caught on fast that my constant nagging to open up would only end with painful silence. So I settled for this, and hoped that one day his answer would be ‘to talk’.

The skin around his eyes smoothed out as his smile dropped and he hummed softly. “A kiss, your voice, and then probably space for an hour or so, please.”

“Your wish,” I said softly, pushing up onto my knees and leaning in for a lingering kiss, citrus from his body wash enveloping me, comfort in the scent. “Is my command.”

Getting to my feet, I grabbed a glass of water, swallowed down three huge mouthfuls, and then sat down beside Ro, who was already singing under his breath, the lyrics to the familiar song Mav was playing falling from him as he smirked at me, eyes dark, hooded, a clear sign that he was either going to fuck me or fight me in the near future. Needing some kind of release, I kinda hoped for both.

Louder than Ro, I started to sing too, the contrast in our voices making me shiver excitedly. I tried to think back to a time when his voice didn’t excite me, but it was hard to recall. I wondered if maybe it had always had this effect, and I’d just ignored it a little too well. It was quite possible that everything I felt these days had been simmering under the surface for years. Attraction had always been shrugged off, excused with the fact that I wasn’t blind, I could see how delicious my bandmates were. Love had been twisted into this thing that felt closer to how I felt about my sister. Romance had been taken out of the equation because as my sister’s friend Hadley always said – you don’t shit where you eat.

Maybe, maybe it was all a lot more than I realised.

A lot more than I was ready to accept too.

“You sure you’re okay?” Mav asked me. It was then that I noticed that Ro was singing louder than me, and I wasn’t doing a damn thing about it. The volume of my voice had dropped, so soft and quiet that it could’ve passed off as a baby’s lullaby.

Pulling myself together, I smiled his way, barely meeting his eye as I stopped singing. “I’m fine, really.”

He didn’t look convinced. I looked around the lounge, taking in my bandmate’s faces. Jordan didn’t look like he believed me for a second, neither did Cole, and neither did Ro. My bassist grabbed my chin between his thumb and forefinger and turned my head, searching my face for a few moments as I tried not to click my tongue at him in annoyance.

I caved though, the sound loud, irritated, and exactly what he needed in order to decide what to do with me. Ro wasn’t going to push me for answers or truths or anything else. Ro was going to start a fight. A fight that could keep me from overthinking and distract me.

It was possibly the sweetest thing he’d ever done.

I was on edge today, on top of everything else I had the memory of that post-it note from all those days ago creeping into my thoughts. I hadn’t found the right time to mention it to the guys, and they hadn’t seemed to notice me checking my phone more often and double checking the windows were locked constantly. I wanted to scream at them to really notice, to not just ask if I was alright, but to ask me what was really going on, but at the same time, part of me wanted to keep it to myself. For once, I didn’t want any of them to save me. It had been personal, that note, meant only for me. They had enough to deal with without me bringing even more drama their way, so kept my mouth shut, and bathed in the tension crackling in the air between me and Ro.

“Don’t click your fucking tongue at me,” he snarled.

“Don’t grab my face like that then, arsehole.” I glared at him, heat rushing through my body.

Jord was up in a flash, grumbling about us starting this shit again as he disappeared to his bunk. Cole gave me a questioning look, then nodded, realising what was going on, then he disappeared too. Mav placed his guitar down, then leaned back in his chair, watching us with an amused expression for once as we started to argue, throwing childish insults at each other for some time until Ro was getting to his feet, storming off down the bus, and shouting back at me to get my ass in the bedroom before he bent me over his knee and gave me a real reason to click my stupid fucking tongue.

I tried not to laugh, not wanting to lose hold of the anger that Ro had built up for me, his gift to me, but when Mav smiled at me it escaped me in a short burst.

“Thank you,” he whispered, then closed his eyes, tipping his head back against the soft fabric behind him.

I got to my feet, about to follow Ro, who wasstillshouting, then paused beside Mav. I had done this for him as much as for myself. I pushed his blonde mess of hair away from his face, and kissed his forehead, whispering quietly, “Enjoy your space, baby.”

“I will,” he mumbled, and then I was gone, stomping dramatically down the length of the bus towards the bedroom.

I didn’t make it the whole way though, the sound of a man cursing loudly in the bathroom halting me outside the door. “Hang on, Ro,” I shouted down to him, and was met with his pissed-off scowl appearing in the doorway.

“You have five minutes,” he growled. “Then I’m coming for you.”

“I don’t doubt that,” I muttered, then knocked on the bathroom door. “Everything okay?”

“I’m good, carry on with your day, nothing to see here.” It was Cole’s voice, distinctly cheerful, coming from the bathroom, and I wondered what the hell he was up to in there.

“Okay,” I said slowly, dragging the word out, then making loud footstep noises with my feet as I hovered outside the door, ear pressed to the wood.

When he thought I had gone, Cole started to sing, so badly, some made-up song about his sexy beard, and I knew straight away that I needed to get in there. Fuck my need for release, it could wait just a minute, right now I quite fancied a good laugh.

Pushing down on the handle, I found the door was unlocked. I eased it open just a fraction, and there, through the crack, was Cole, topless, tattooed back to me, dark skulls and wilting roses on full display as he wiggled his ass to his little song and continued toshave.

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