All her points were correct, but she hadn’t really answered his question, and he supposed, that was an answer in and of itself. “So you haven’t told him. And he hasn’t asked?” That was, to Miles’s mind, weakness. If he hadn’t asked, he wouldn’t know and then there’s nothing to be done and it left Harlow responsible for something an adult did.

  “I don’t want him to ask. I don’t lie to him, and I don’t want to hurt his heart. He has a good life, Miles. A wife who adores him. A great kid who knows how much she’s loved and valued. His music still sells well. I’m on my own, supporting myself. My brothers have lives with kids and all that. He deserves peace.”

  Miles heard the defensiveness in her tone. And while he did have to wonder why any father would allow this to continue, he didn’t want to put Harlow in a place where she had to defend her dad. That was Miles’s to understand, and it wasn’t cool to make her responsible for it.

  “I’m sorry you have to deal with this. It should have been a fun night and it wasn’t. Which is not your fault. In any way.”

  “I just wish I knew whatever it was that makes her hate me so much.”

  “You can’t always make sense of things that are senseless, baby.” He kissed her temple and she leaned into him a moment.

  He used a pet name.

  No matter how sad she was about the situation at her brother’s house earlier, Harlow knew she and Miles had stepped into a deeper part of their relationship. He’d protected and defended her, took care of her when she’d been so very sad. She’d told him things less than a handful of people knew.

  And he’d listened. Heard what she was saying and understood what she hadn’t. There were so few people in the world she could say that about and it mattered far more than he could ever know.

  Harlow knew she’d have to give him the same trust in return that he’d given her. Having the space to speak without interruption didn’t always happen. It didn’t even happen most of the time. Usually, it was about things that mattered less than what she’d just told Miles. But the safety in that sort of relationship was beyond alluring. It seemed very necessary now that she had it and it was impossible not to wonder how differently things would have gone in prior relationships if it had been there.

  “Can you talk to your aunt about any of this?” he asked. “I know you and she are close.”

  Harlow told him, “I absolutely could. She’s a person I can go to about anything. But, well, I don’t usually. It’s hard for her when I bring Gloria up. She and Gloria don’t get along and Marcella considers me her kid and she gets super heated when Gloria makes me or my dad upset. Once when my mom still lived in So. Cal, I was at her house visiting but she’d taken my brothers out somewhere and I was there alone. I called because I got scared. Marcella drove out to Orange County to get me and as she was packing my stuff up, Gloria came back. But she wasn’t mad I was leaving, just that Marcella was in her house. Whatever Marcella whispered to Gloria that day must have scared Gloria deeply because she never left me alone like that again. There were other things, as you can see.” Harlow’s laugh was rueful. “But I think Gloria is terrified of Marcella.”

  “I knew I liked your aunt.”

  “She’s the best. I’m very lucky. Many kids don’t have a backup mom or dad. They have the crappy ones they were born to and that’s that.”

  “That’s not lucky.” Miles shook his head. “That’s basic. Kids should grow up in a house where they’re loved and protected. I know that’s not what some kids have, and it’s fucked up. But that doesn’t mean Gloria gets points. I really do not like her.”

  “Me either.” She clinked her spoon to his and then he, the cad, sucked all her ice cream off! “Cheeky!”

  That made him laugh. “My mum uses cheeky all the time.”

  “Enough about my fucked up family. Tell me something about your life.”

  He snorted as he held up a spoonful of ice cream for her. “In exchange for what I swiped from you earlier.”

  That made her laugh but that didn’t stop her from eating his ice cream.

  “My family is fucked up in its own way. Like most families. I didn’t know who my dad was for many years. Neither did my mum, who is biologically my aunt, but she adopted me when I was born. Anyway, I had a birth mother who avoided me, but my mum shielded me from it and loved me so fiercely and filled my life with other people who cared about me that I never noticed. It was when my birth mother died that we finally found out who my father was. My mother braved so much to go to Adrian to tell him about me. And she did it for me. Not for herself and not even for my dad.

  “And suddenly my life was full of Browns. My dad made it absolutely clear from the start that he wanted to be an active part of my life. My aunt, Erin, and uncle, Brody, their kids, and partners all opened their lives to me and made a spot I’d be comfortable in. I used to be shy and quiet.”

  That made her laugh.

  “Truly I was. And they respected that too even though they were loud and brash and full of music and art. The longer I was around them, the more I came out of my shell. It’s still a little anxious before a show and I do like my privacy very much. But I’m a far more outgoing personality than I was then.”

  Who wasn’t?

  But she got his point. And liked very much that he had this large family unit who had done nothing but love him with all their hearts.

  It was on the tip of her tongue to ask him about other girlfriends or boyfriends in his past. She’d gotten a quick overview when she’d looked him up online. But so much of that stuff was half true or basically all rumor and it had felt sort of yucky to dig deeper rather than just ask him.

  Harlow gathered all their dishes and put them and the tray out in the hall before returning to the bedroom. She paused in the doorway, just watching him clear off the bed and straighten everything.

  He was beautifully masculine. Tall with long legs and delightfully muscled thighs. Wide shoulders. The line of his jaw covered by his beard was still sharp, his arms covered in the same dark hair as his chest. His ink was a work in progress, she’d noted, but it managed to cover so much of his back and shoulders without being too heavy. A Celtic dragon in black and gray with a tiny bit of white shading here and there. Quietly powerful. Sort of how Miles was.

  When he had clothes on, he was absurdly gorgeous. Naked? He was magnificent. Either way, Harlow had to take a moment extra to appreciate the way he made her feel. He took care of things to make her life easier. He listened. He walked in front of her to part the crowd when they were backstage. She could do things for herself. Did so every day and would continue that. She liked being independent and self-reliant.

  But she also liked being able to lean on someone. Had gotten used to it even as she remained grateful for him.

  CHAPTER

  FOURTEEN

  “You should take your clothes off,” she said, leaning her hip against the nearby desk.

  “I should? Do you have dirty plans for me? Because that’d be great.” He grinned.

  “The day I don’t have dirty plans for you is the day I’m unconscious. And even then.” She pulled her t-shirt off and folded it before laying it over the back of a chair.

  He matched her by disposing of his shirt and unceremoniously shoving his sleep pants down, stepping out of them and tossing them to the chair where her clothes had landed too.

  And then he was utterly naked as he came toward her, stealing her breath because he was so much. It might have been too much for her even six months earlier, but where she was in her life right then? She looked upon just what and who Miles was to her and though she was anxious about it, about fucking it up, she welcomed it. Wanted the enormity of this person in her life. And she wasn’t just thinking of his lovely dick with that delightful, thick hoop with those beads that hit everything worth stroking every time he thrust into her pussy.

  He watched her through slumbrous eyes and she met that with a smile that told him what she was thinking,

  Then he crooked his finger in her direction with a c’mere motion and she probably should have made him do the moving but why the fuck not move there to him so she could get her hands on the man?

  The way he looked at her was nearly as much as a caress. It left her feeling beautiful and desired. Powerful that someone like him would want her this way.

  He opened his arms as she neared and she walked into his embrace, pausing to bury her face in the curve of his shoulder, taking a deep breath of his skin. Of that scent that she believed she’d know in the dark. Just like she’d know the feel of his body against hers, the muscles in his forearm and biceps bunching as he moved.

  “What you do to me, Harlow Martin, what you do to me,” Miles murmured against her hair.

  What she did to him? What about the way he waltzed right into her life and had her telling him things she’d only told less than three people before he came along?

  All thoughts skittered away like a leaf in a breeze when he reached up and cupped her throat, holding her in place as he moved, kissing along her shoulder and then to her mouth.

  The frantic beat of her pulse against his fingers as he cupped her throat called to him. Miles held her that way and she melted into him. It quieted everything outside, allowing him to focus on her. On Harlow and her pleasure.

  On how simply by existing, she was his pleasure.

  He turned, carefully and slowly so she didn’t trip, and walked them over to the bed where he dropped her to the mattress and loomed over her while he looked his fill at her. Lips glossy and plump from where he’d been kissing them. Her nipples stood dark and hard, and he noted she wore a different hoop through her piercing.

  “I like this,” he told her as he traced a fingertip over her nipple and then tugged lightly on the jewelry until she gasped and arched into his touch.

  “So do I,” she said, her words slightly slurred from the state of pleasure that had washed over her.

  He did that. Pride roared through him. This beautiful flame in his life came alive at his touch. This secret face she wore when it was just them two of them alone, bare to one another.

  Dropping to his knees, ignoring her frustrated cry when his dick was out of her reach, Miles left a trail of openmouthed kisses from her ankle, up her calf, behind her knee and over the velvet softness of her inner thigh. First one leg and then the other. Teasing not just Harlow, but himself.

  Because he wanted to taste her. Wanted to kiss the heart of her in a way that would sear her memory forever. He craved her taste. The salty sweet of her pussy and the sounds she made when he went down on her were things he knew for sure he’d never forget.

  When he spread her open with his thumbs, he leaned close to take several long, slow licks, triumphing in the way she shuddered, and her fingers slid into his hair and tightened.

  He took his time. Building her up with nuzzles, licks and quick sucks of her clit between his lips. He’d loved learning all her cues, knowing that the flex of her thigh muscles meant she was close to climax.

  He wanted it. Not as much as she probably did, but as much as he craved her taste, he craved her orgasms. Loved it when he made her come.

  Miles used his palms on her hips to tip her up so he could get at more of her pussy as he drove her higher and higher until she arched on a snarl of his name and filled his senses with only her.

  Harlow opened her eyes and stretched her muscles as little aftershocks of pleasure chased through her body. Her hips were a little tender where his fingers had dug into the flesh and muscle as he’d driven her mindless with pleasure. Her skin bruised easily and the first time he’d left a fingerprint bruise on her left ass cheek he’d been immediately sorry, but she wasn’t sorry one bit. She liked it when there was a mark. It hadn’t come from pain or anyone trying to harm her in any way. That was why she kissed him soundly on the mouth, told him she was just fine and to stop apologizing.

  He was already putting a condom on, so she rolled up to her knees and bent, smiling against the blankets at the sound he made.

  “So fucking beautiful I may die of it,” he mumbled as he lined up behind her, his thighs against hers. He hissed as he slid into her pussy and she tightened herself around him, moaning as the bead on his piercing stroked against her inner walls.

  Miles ran the edge of his nails down her spine and then back up again, then he tangled his hands in her hair and pulled her head back as he bent down, both straining to kiss the other as he began to stroke his cock deep into her cunt and back out again. Over and over and over until she was the one who thought she might die of pleasure as he left her there, right on the edge of coming again.

  He kept control of the pace, even as she squirmed against him, delighting in his grunts and snarls as she pulled him closer and closer to his own climax.

  More. She needed more of him. All he had to give and maybe a tiny bit more than that. She’d take what he offered freely, but with Miles there was always greed. Just one more kiss even moments after the last kiss had ended. When she watched him perform, she now knew what he looked like while he fucked her, and it had been impossible not to see one while he did the other.

  “Make yourself come,” he told her.

  She had to redistribute her weight and balance to free one of her arms to reach her clit and that first touch told her it wasn’t going to be very long. He must have known that because he sped up his thrusts, fucking into her, the sound each time his body met hers was a muffled slap and that was all she needed, that last nudge and she exploded around his cock.

  “Fuck,” he wheezed and pressed two more times before he came as well.

  CHAPTER

  FIFTEEN

  “I know it was a shitty way to get to this point,” Miles said to himself, “but damn if it’s not fucking awesome to wake up to my bed warm from my woman.”

  Harlow was in the shower, singing an Earthquakes song, which eased satisfaction aside and replaced it with pride. Maddie had a great voice and she had pretty much no competition at her level, and Miles would be the first person to say so. But Harlow’s smoky, whisky rough voice did something to him.

  And she knew he would hear. A compliment to him in her own way.

  Smiling, got out of bed, pulled on some pants, and went to get the breakfast he’d ordered when they’d finally been ready to sleep the night before.

  While she was still in the shower, he took a moment to text Nora to let her know Harlow was okay.

  But she called him. “Talking is better than texting. How is she this morning?”

  “She’s in the shower right now. Before she went in there, she said she wanted a big breakfast which just arrived.”

  “Tell me what happened.”

  Nora was bossy as hell. Probably needed to be to practically live with Harlow half the year when they were on the road.

  Then again, she hit those drums hard, so she had her own fire.

  Miles gave her a bullet pointed explanation of the whole situation at Hector and Mindy’s place. He knew Nora had heard from Harlow all the shit Gloria had pulled, or part of it, Miles figured she kept the worst of it to herself. He also knew the two shared a deep loyalty and trust, so he didn’t sugar coat it.

  Nora cursed at the end. “Lazy slut? That fucking woman. I’m glad you were there and that you got her out of that place. This won’t be the last she hears of it. Gloria has a long game planned. She’ll drag out whatever this is to give maximum impact.”

  “What is her damage anyway?”

  “Who knows? Over years Harlow has wondered the same. I can’t ask Richie because he will definitely get involved.”

  “Well, maybe he should?” Miles walked a careful line here.

  “You and I, and most likely Richie would agree. But Har doesn’t. And she gave me her trust. I can’t betray it.”

  “No, You’re right.” He didn’t know Richie well enough to say how the man would feel one way or the other. But the way he’d built his life around Harlow’s schedule when she was growing up so he could be an active part of her life was a clue.

  “She just turned the water off. I need to go.”

  “Tell her I said to check in with me when she’s done with breakfast,” Nora said.

  “I will. Do you think her brothers will show up tonight? Or should I tell them not to or?” Miles just wanted to make things better for her. She deserved it.

  “Don’t get in the middle of that part. Be there whatever happens. She loves them. Even when she knows they’re weak and don’t love her the way she deserves. We will all be with her tonight if they show up or if they don’t. Someone might get hit in the head with a guitar, who knows?” Nora laughed.

  Miles really liked Nora.

  Harlow smelled coffee and moments later, bacon and so she quickened and got her clothes on before heading out to the living room where he’d set up breakfast at the table.

  “Poppy just brought by dailies and stole a piece of bacon. Said it was her price for not complaining that you won’t be at yoga this morning.”

  “Look at you tattling on your baby sister,” Harlow said as she opened the curtains all the way to see the city outside.

  “Hey, look, I know not to mess with your bacon. Poppy has to face that on her own. I’m no fool.”

  She noted the bottle of hot sauce, pleased he remembered she loved it on her potatoes and eggs.

  Harlow needed to do a quick check of the calendar on her phone to be sure there was nothing more than signing some merch and a meet and greet with fans on her schedule that day. She hadn’t turned it on yet, not wanting to face whatever might be there—or not—after that scene the night before.