Jacks ran a hand over his jaw, felt the stubble that was starting to come in, and breathed out. He didn’t think he could ignore all the thoughts in his head, or the questions that refused to stay buried. Now was just as good a time as any to bring this shit up he supposed. “Why did you haul ass out of town after we slept together?”
4
The music, the drugs and booze, all of it was thrust in his face like an evil temptation that wouldn’t let up its sadistic hold. If Beats was smart he would have turned away from all of this, hidden in a room until the devil and his toys were no longer in his face.
He tipped back his beer, the only thing he allowed himself to drink that was alcohol related after all the shit he had willingly put himself through.
He looked at Zoe, with her softness surrounding her, and the scent of something sweet filling his nose and drowning out all of the waste that filled the room. He shouldn’t be staring at her so blatantly, and if he was a better man he would have taken her away from the drugs, the tits and pussy that were on full display right in front of them, and told her all the things he should have said.
But Beats had never told anyone how he felt for her, never wanted to risk breaking up the tightly knit bond they all had.
There was a part of him that said acting platonic with Zoe, almost to the point that he could disregard the way she looked at him, talked to him, and clearly cared for him, was a totally fucked up thing to do. And then there was another part that asked why should he hide the way he felt because he was afraid to rock the boat?
But it wasn’t just about them all being best friends, but also that he was just as close to her older brother Lane as he was with Matty, Jacks, and Five.
He curled his free hand into a fist, and brought his beer up to his mouth with his other one and finished off the beer. He would have set it on the table, but the pink haired chick was still getting coke snorted off of her pussy, and was getting her tits felt up by two different guys. He looked at Zoe again, saw how big her eyes were, and felt like the biggest fucking prick in the world.
“Come on.” He grabbed her hand and stood, pulling her up in the process, too.
“Where are we going?” Her long blonde hair was in a low, loose ponytail, and a few strands fell from the confines of the elastic holding it together.
Shit, he wanted to touch her hair, brush it away from her face and see if it was as soft as it looked. He should have won a fucking Academy Award for his acting skills in playing it off like she was one of the guys. He had never even told his band-mates, and they knew every disgusting detail of his life and downfall.
How would Zoe see him if she knew at one point in his life, not long ago in fact, he had been a slave to the chemical kind of comfort?
He shook his head and gritted his teeth, but he didn’t stop moving through the crowd and right out of the room. He wanted to be alone with her, just to talk and catch up.
This life was great, but he wanted to go back in time to a place where he wasn’t snorting coke, popping pills, and passing out on the bathroom floor of too many hotel bathrooms to count.
5
Tanner’s heart was beating fast and hard, and she rolled what Jacks had just said in her head over and over again. She had thought about the way she had left Brookstone not long after they had slept together, and how up until she had left she had kept her distance.
There was no denying it was a shitty thing to do, but at the time it had felt like the right thing to do.
Of course she had been young and stupid, and even though five years wasn’t really a long time in the grand scheme of things, Tanner had grown and matured a lot. That night had been the most wonderful experience she had ever had, but once the euphoria had settled and reality crashed back into her, she had realized that what she had done was probably the biggest mistake of her life.
A lot of fears had slammed into her, ones of a ruined friendship, the awkwardness and confrontation, and then the silence. They were all things that petrified her. She didn’t just love Jacks as a friend. She had been in love with him—still was, too.
She exhaled, knowing that this would eventually come up, but not thinking it would have been on the same night they reunited. “Leaving, at that time at least, just seemed like the right thing to do.” They were quiet for several seconds, and she was actually afraid to look at him to see his expression.
“The right thing to do?” The way Jacks spoke was almost deadpan, like he didn’t have any emotion left inside of him.
“Yeah.” She licked her lips and glanced down at her feet. “I was a scared eighteen-year-old girl that had just let one of her best friends take her virginity. I worried about losing everything we had. Running might seem like the stupidest thing I have ever done when I think about it now, but, Jacks, in my mind at the time it seemed like the only thing that was smart.” She looked at him then.
He didn’t look upset, and in fact didn’t look like anything. He was just stoic, and she hated that most of all.
“You know, I loved you back then, Tanner.”
“I know, Jacks. I loved you, too. You were one of my best friends.”
He was shaking his head before she even finished.
“No, I loved you in the not best friend kind of way.” He held her gaze with his own for several long seconds. “I was so fucking in love with you, and when we had sex it wasn’t because we had been drinking, or that it just was something to pass the time. I was not fucking you, but making love to you.”
Her heart started pounding fast and hard at his words. She remembered the sex, the hard and rough thrusting, but also the soft kisses, the way he had stroked her lips with his tongue, and then licked every part of her body like he was trying to memorize her. He had been rough and brutal, consuming and intoxicating, but for Jacks and the guy he was, it had been perfect and right.
She rubbed her eyes, wishing that this conversation hadn’t taken place at this wild ass party. As it was she could hear girls squealing, and when she looked up she could see that some guys were sucking and biting at the woman’s nipples.
“I have wanted to have this conversation for a while, Jacks. I just wish it wasn’t where some chick was getting coke sucked off of her crotch.” Before she knew what was happening he had her hand in his, leading them back to the party, and right out the front doors. “Jacks, what are you doing?” She had managed to wave and shrug to Zoe, who was still sitting right beside Beats, but it had been fast and in passing.
“I want to have this conversation right now, and you want privacy…” He didn’t finish that sentence, but she knew what he was doing now.
Jacks led them down the ornate and rustic hallway to the last door at the other end of the building. Once the door to the room was opened he led her inside. The room was much smaller than the suite they had just left, but it still had that wild, all natural pine setting going on.
“I didn’t mean we had to haul ass out of there to talk.” And she hadn’t, and hoped it hadn’t come out that way. “That just wasn’t the setting I envisioned having this conversation at.”
He nodded, but looked tense. He walked over to the bar in the corner and poured himself a drink. “You want something?”