“And in doing so you took decisions away from me. Instead, you gave my son the same fucking fate as my mom handed me. You left him to feel like he wasn’t worthy enough to be loved. Like I’d abandoned him. Like his—”

  “Don’t you fucking dare,” I shout, turning in a flash. His accusation staggers me and stuns me. How did I not think of this? How did I not look through Vince’s eyes and see the correlation he would make? “That little boy has been loved every second of every minute of every day. He deserves nothing less, so I tried to give him everything I could to make up for the decisions I made. Don’t you dare accuse me of not giving him enough love.”

  I say the words, but the images of the past few days flash back and gut me. Jagger and Vince on their guitars. Jagger wrestling with Vince on the grass. Jagger falling asleep on Vince’s chest as they watch action movies together.

  Guilt. It fucking owns every part of me and makes me fight even harder to prove that I was enough for Jagg. That I didn’t deprive him of his needs because of my fear and selfishness.

  “You asked me what derailed my dreams? My plans? It was that love for him. I never left his side. I tried to be both parents and then some, so stop breaking the glass too unless you want to bring the whole goddamn house down.”

  I can’t breathe. I can’t think. My chest hurts as I mentally own my mistakes and shortcomings. As I acknowledge the things I deprived them both of.

  Vince just stares at me with hollow eyes. All I want to do is hug him. To fight him. To rebel against this history of ours that has done this to us.

  “I asked you what set you back, Bristol. I opened the fucking door so wide for you to tell me that it broke off its hinges. Christ, at your house, on the porch, I told you I knew you were holding something back. Why couldn’t you have trusted me then?”

  “I nearly did. I was this fucking close,” I say and hold my thumb and forefinger an inch apart. “But you know what you said to me?”

  He shakes his head. Still so angry. “Nothing that justifies your excuses.”

  “You said, ‘It’s okay. You don’t owe it to me. I understand that.’” I close my eyes momentarily but not before I see his shoulders fall and his jaw clench.

  “So that’s why you didn’t tell me? Because I gave you fucking permission not to? You’re impossible to fucking love, you know that?” he says.

  “Me?” I startle. “You’re the selfish prick who can’t acknowledge—”

  “Selfish?” He lets out a growl that echoes off the walls of the studio. “You’re so full of shit. So wrapped up in excuses you can’t see straight.”

  “Excuse me for being just like you then . . .”

  He stands a foot away from me, with that muscle pulsing in his jaw, his hair a fucking mess, his eyes glaring at me, and everything I’ve ever wanted just within reach.

  One second stretches to five.

  And on the sixth one, we strike the match and willingly welcome the flames.

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  Vince

  My lips crash over hers.

  Taking what I want.

  Taking what we need. The time since we last touched feels like years rather than weeks. Weeks of wanting a woman, knowing no other will satisfy me. Hours of thinking what it would feel like to have her again.

  Our kiss is hungry. Desperate. Winner takes all. And fuck if it’s not exactly like I feel right now. I’m so sick of wanting her but hating her. Of loving her but resenting her. Of missing her but being confused by everything that comes with us.

  Just fucking us.

  I let my needs take over. I allow the anger to drown out my head. I permit my body to use the feel of her to get lost in the moment.

  And Jesus, does she feel good.

  The taste of her tongue. The smell of her skin. The heat of her body.

  I’m desperate for more of her. Of this. Of not thinking.

  Everything about her makes me feel out of control. My emotions. My reactions. What happens next.

  It feels so damn good to fist my hand in her hair and gently tug her head back. Her lips are swollen. Her chest is heaving. Her cheeks are pink. “You think you can come into my studio? Fight with me? And then fuck me?”

  Defiance is in her smile and desire owns her eyes. “Isn’t that the best kind?”

  My balls ache at her words. At her challenge. At getting the chance to fucking do this again. Do her again. “This doesn’t solve anything.”

  “No?”

  “No,” I murmur with the shake of my head and a lick of my tongue up the side of her neck. She tastes like salt and sex, and I’m fucking here for it. “Fucking you. Pleasuring you,” I whisper into her ear. “Doesn’t fix a goddamn thing except for fucking up my head more than it already is.”

  Except for only making me want you even more.

  Her throat bobs with her swallow, but the ghost of a smile remains on her lips. I take my free hand and slide it beneath her waistband. The absence of panties is a welcome surprise, but it’s the strip of tight curls that tickle my fingers and the slickness just below it that has me emitting a tortured groan. She widens her legs without me having to ask and grants me access to the heaven between.

  “I want you, Vince,” she murmurs, her lips inches from mine. “I never stop wanting you. Even when we’re fighting, even when we’re apart, even when you hate me, I never stop wanting you.”

  Her words do things to my insides. Overwhelm me. Fuel me.

  I crash my mouth back to hers as my finger tucks inside her warm, wet heat. My tongue slides in and out of her mouth much like my fingers do in her pussy. I take and take and take from her until we can’t breathe and her hips are bucking forward into my hand.

  Enough fucking foreplay.

  Enough fucking waiting.

  I break off the damn kiss and hold her eyes. “We’re going to get undressed, Shug, and then you’re going to get on your hands and knees like the good girl you are so that I can admire your ass.”

  I release her hair and with our eyes still on one another’s, we both undress. Shirts overhead. Pants shoved down. And then she lowers herself to her knees and looks over her shoulder at me, as she props herself up on her hands.

  Jesus fucking Christ.

  The sight of her here like this. Ass up. Thighs glistening from her arousal. Pussy just waiting for me to pound.

  I don’t think I’ve ever been this hard in my life. Or this desperate.

  “That’s my girl,” I murmur as I drop to my own knees, grab the globes of her ass with both hands, and then dip down to stick my tongue in her pussy. Her yelp fills the room and her taste owns my senses.

  I bury my nose between her thighs and lap up everything she gives me. With the guidance of my hand, I press her hips back and forth so she’s fucking my face. Her scent. Her taste. The feel of her. It’s a goddamn high like no other.

  Well, except for one.

  And I’m about to take that right now.

  “You like that?” I murmur as I bite her ass playfully. “You like knowing you can own me like that with your taste? That you can drive me fucking crazy?”

  “I was so close to coming.” Her words are breathless, strained, and fuck if they don’t all but undo me.

  “Mmm.” I run my hand from her neck down her spine and then pat her pussy hard enough that she quivers in response.

  Talk about a beautiful sight. All that slick, pink flesh reacting like that.

  “I want to be inside of you when you come, Shug. I want to feel you. I want to see you. I want to own you.”

  She moans as I trace my fingers ever so gently around her opening. And with lips and chin and nose wet and smelling like her addictive scent, I rear back up, jacket myself with a condom, and push my way into her.

  Fucking hell.

  This woman.

  She’s going to be my goddamn downfall and my only fucking salvation.

  I hold her still by her hips as I revel in the feel of her. In her wetness coating my balls. In the sensations slowly beginning to build when I haven’t even started yet.

  I look down. At her ass. At the inch or so of my cock unable to fit inside her. At the stretch of her skin around me, accepting me, and then fighting to keep me in as I slide out for the first time.

  Bristol pushes back onto me, little pulses back and forth of her body so my head can hit whatever spot within she needs.

  It feels like heaven.

  She feels like heaven.

  “God, you’re beautiful like this. I love the way you do that.” She moans as I grind into her slowly. “It’s never felt like this before. Never,” I say and then lean forward to press my lips to her shoulder. The motion pushes me even farther into her and earns a panted plea of my name. I chuckle against her shoulder as I close my hand around the front of her throat like a necklace. “You take my dick so goddamn well, you know that? So fucking well.” I nip then suck on the curve of her neck.

  And when I raise back up, lightheaded and body burning with need, I know I can’t hold back anymore. I’ve stalled long enough that the pleasure has now turned into pain. That my need has now become greed.

  “Hey, Shug?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Brace yourself because it’s my name I want on your lips when you scream.”

  This time I pull out and then slam back into her with enough force that her ass jiggles from it. Between the sight of that and the feel of her and the sound of her soft, begging mewl, the restraint snaps.

  I fuck her. Hard. Fast. Unrelenting. With a savage passion I can’t control.

  Our bodies slap. Her pussy soaks me and flexes around me as my cock swells so much it hurts.

  “C’mon. C’mon. C’mon,” I beg, because I’m doing everything I can to stop myself before she can go. My fingers bruise her hips. My thighs burn with restraint. My goddamn balls ache for release.

  And the minute she calls out, “Vince,” I’m a goddamn goner.

  My vision goes black and my breath falls short, as I pump everything I have into her until my thoughts are gone and my heart is full.

  Until I know that no one will ever be able to make me feel the way she does. Never.

  And that only confuses matters even more.

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  Vince

  “How come every time we get together, I end up on my back?” Bristol asks through a panted breath.

  I shift up on my elbow so I can look at her. Her hair is a mess, her cheeks are flushed, and her smiling lips are swollen from mine. I could never get tired of looking at her like this—gorgeous, sated, looking back at me with something in her eyes that makes my heart feel like it’s going to beat out of my chest. I lean forward and brush a kiss to her lips before leaning my forehead on hers and reaching out to rest a hand on her stomach. When she tries to shift away, I tighten my fingers on her side, forcing her to let me leave my hand there.

  What was it like when she was pregnant? Did she have morning sickness? What weird foods did she crave? What did Jagger’s heartbeat sound like? What did it feel like when he kicked against her swollen belly? What did his first cries sound like?

  And where the fuck did those thoughts even come from? For a guy who never wanted kids, Jennings, you sure as fuck are thinking too much.

  And yet . . . the questions I’ll never have answers to still linger.

  “I played him your music all the time,” Bristol murmurs almost as if she can hear my thoughts. “Interviews that you’d given. Songs that you’d sung. I rested the phone on my belly and played them over and over. I wanted him to know your voice.”

  Processing all of this has been a mental and emotional overload. To go from zero to one hundred eighty in what feels like two seconds is overwhelming and discombobulating.

  To think I’ve been content with not wanting one thing my whole life to now having it and trying to understand why I’m not fighting against it harder.

  To look at Bristol and resent her for what she did. Sure, I could look at myself—at Mick putting her off, at having Hawke block her in my phone, at not returning her calls—but rehashing the past doesn’t justify her silence over the past weeks. It doesn’t give her a free pass.

  To look at Jagger, I see myself in every fiber of him, and then in the few places I’m not, I see Bristol there.

  I offer a slight nod in response and then lie back on the rug and stare at the ceiling. What am I supposed to say, thank you? Because while I am glad she tried to keep me present in his life—I wasn’t in his life in the most important way possible.

  “Vince . . . I’m sorry. That’s all I can say to you, and I hope you really hear it. I’m sorry. I did what I thought was right. It never crossed my mind what you said about your mom and Jagger being left to feel the same way about you.” She sounds as conflicted as I feel. “Please know I did call. I did try, but when you blocked me, when your road manager offered me a check to take care of it in whichever way I pleased, I—”

  “Christ.” The memory comes back with a vengeance. Even after all these years, the conversation stuck out in my head then and now, again. The joke about Crystal.

  Crystal.

  Bristol.

  He could have easily heard one name when she said the other.

  I run a hand through my hair and sigh with a heaviness Bristol will never understand. Talk about making subconscious choices.

  I was so far down a rabbit hole trying to convince myself that I didn’t love Bristol, would hearing she was pregnant make any difference? I’d like to think I’m a better man than that, but back then . . . hell, there’s a huge difference from age twenty-three to thirty.

  I’d like to think the man I am today is better than that . . . but I guess that remains to be seen.

  “What’s wrong?” she asks.

  “Nothing. It’s just . . .” It’s just you can’t go back, Vin. You made as many mistakes as she did, just in different ways. If you can forgive yourself, does that mean you should forgive her? “That explains why you were so angry with me at the video shoot. So bitter with me,” I say, dots connecting the more I replay all the time we’ve spent together.

  “Yeah.” It’s barely audible. “I was shocked to see you there. It was like part of me wanted to jump into your arms and hold on, while the other needed to keep you at arm’s length, terrified you’d find out about Jagg before I could figure out the right thing to do. A lot of good all that did me, huh?”

  “Humph.” But it makes sense of something I couldn’t put my finger on before. Why I felt her pushing so hard against me when her eyes said the exact opposite.

  “The no fraternizing with clients thing was real, though . . . as my current state of non-employment shows.”

  “I’ll take care of that for you.”

  “I don’t want you to take care of anything for me. I’ve caused enough turmoil for now. I can figure out my own life.”

  And even though I clearly know she will since she’s done all this on her own thus far, I still want to take care of it for her. In fact, I know that I will.

  But thoughts of McMann and her job are easy targets for me to focus on, distractions, instead of what we really need to talk about.

  I close my eyes and see him sleeping. The rise and fall of his chest. The hair mussed by the pillow. His skin that smells like lotion.

  “I stare at him sometimes. It’s impossible to look away.”

  “I still feel that way,” she whispers.

  “He’s incredible, Shug. You . . . you’ve done such an amazing job with him.”

  She doesn’t say thank you. She doesn’t reach out and grab my hand despite the sex we just had. It’s almost as if that specific contact after everything we’ve been through would be more intimate. Would mean we’re fine with the things we’ve done to each other when neither of us are anywhere near being so. Rather, she just sits in silence beside me, trying to judge where and how I feel, because I’m still trying to figure that out myself.

  “Why are you so scared of him?” she finally asks.

  She can still read me like a fucking book. And my response is the most honest answer I’ve ever given in my life. “I don’t want to ruin his perfect.”

  The admission costs me more than I thought it would. Emotion burns in my throat and tears well in my eyes, as regret rivals resentment inside me.

  “Vince. You’re not going to—”

  “I ruin everything that matters.”

  She presses a kiss to my shoulder and just leaves her lips there as she speaks. “For the record, he’s far from perfect. He’s been on his best behavior while we’ve been here. His perfect falls from grace every once in a while, and we’re left with tantrums and obstinance and a refusal to eat anything that’s the color vegetable as he calls it.”

  I should know that. I should know what he likes and doesn’t like. How he gets cranky when he’s tired. How he pitches a fit when you tell him no.

  But would I have wanted to if I’d had the decision before he was born to know that? Is it easier because I can’t refute it since he’s in living color in front of me?

  My thoughts keep fucking with me. Keep playing devil’s advocate against me. Keep rioting against accepting what I feel so easily.

  “I know, Vince. I can hear you thinking. I robbed you of knowing any and all of that. Of experiencing it firsthand. There is nothing I can say other than I’m sorry.”

  When she reaches out to place her hand over mine, my whole body tenses. She can feel it. I know she can feel it. But she doesn’t move it. She doesn’t walk away like I’ve done to her. She leaves it there almost as proof that no matter how much I feel like running, she’s staying still.

  “Shug?”

  “Hmm?”

  “I’m struggling with how I feel about . . . everything.”

  “I understand.”

  “No. I don’t think you do.”

  “Then tell me. Talk to me.” She shifts so she can see my face. “Do the one thing you’ve never done before—explain it to me.”

  Explain it to me. Sounds so damn simple to say, but it’s something I’ve never explained to anyone. How do I even fucking start?