Page 26 of Flames and Flowers
I wasn’t the same man who kissed Ash in that castle.
I was a man who was in love with two people I wasn’t even technically with. A man who was desperate to be welcomed into their relationship, into their bed, for them to wrap me up in their arms and never let me go. Maybe put a ring on my finger. Symbolically, at least. Maybe send a letter to my parents that said,Fuck you all. You don’t want him, we’ll take him.
Maybe I thought there was still a chance it could happen, somehow. Despite the fact that I was still terrified to move forward, to give them what they told me they wanted.
Me.
They wanted me and my feelings, our relationship,everything, out in the open.
No more secrets.
And now I was a man who was trashed on tequila at a cocktail party, sitting on a couch with a married woman. Danica sat down with me when I tugged her along, no hesitation; she even draped her arm around my shoulders. Apparently, she still didn’t have any problem cuddling up to me at a party. She never really had a problem with that. She never crossed the line beyond anything I’d see other people, even married people, doing with a close friend at one of these parties. But it was a hell of a lot more than her husband would ever touch me.
Ash was already on the other side of the room.
It was like he was withholding himself, punishing me for my bullshit. He wouldn’t touch me, hadn’t challenged me again, but his eyes said everything.
And through it all, he still trusted me with his wife. He trusted us both.
I looked at Danica next to me, talking to Taylor. I felt her arm around me. Her warmth. And I thought about what it might feel like to drown myself in that warmth. To get lost in her softness. To drift my tongue over every inch of her body… while he watched.
I remembered the first time I met her, when I saw her and Ash together at Brody’s wedding. How beautiful she was. I was so fucking stunned by her, I figured any fantasy I had of hooking up with Ash had gone up in smoke. I figured there was no way in hell I’d be able to compete with her for his attention.
Then I realized I was wrong.
We weren’t in competition.
I saw the way he looked at her, and the way he looked at the two of us when we were together. He watched us, but he did it out of interest. And as I talked to her, I realized I liked her. She was more than a pretty face, and he wasn’t some jealous, possessive boyfriend who plucked her away when she lingered too long, talking to me. I knew that night, if there was any possibility that Ash and his girl would hook up with me, I’d be totally there for it.
I remembered that Christmas party last year, when I thought the three of us might hook up; we’d go on tour together and then we’d go into the studio and somehow we’d end up together—in secret—like some warped fairytale.
But we still weren’t together.
I still couldn’t stop loving them.
It was harder to look Danica in the eye ever since that day in my car, but it wasn’t that I didn’t love her enough. It was that she’d challenged me, too. She’d hinted at what we could’ve had, if I’d owned up to it. She’d called me out in her sweet, gentle way, which was even harder to swallow than Ash serving me my ass on a platter.
But thanks to Danica’s warning, I now got it: it was all or nothing for them. Ash was right—about everything. I wouldn’t admit that I loved him, that I loved them both, so why would he open his marriage to me? I wasn’t worth it. I wasn’t worth blowing up the band over, and I wasn’t worth complicating their marriage for.
I’d tried to focus on the band, on the album that was so important to Ash, like he seemed to want me to; the album that should’ve been so important to me that I wouldn’t do a thing to risk it. And once the album was finished, months from now, I figured we’d go to our separate corners for a while. The band would shift gears. We’d have some promo work, rehearsals, and then we’d head out on tour. By then, I’d be okay.
Or some such bullshit.
It was strangely easy to convince myself of this bullshit when I had the music to focus on, to pour my emotions into. I wasn’t just playing songs written by someone else anymore, like I was on the Dirty tour. I already knew Ashley’s strengths as a songwriter, and Summer’s talent for creating an entire song from the ground up. Even Xander had talent in that field; unlike so many drummers I’d worked with, he didn’t just sit back and play what he was told. So it was important to me that I prove myself as a writer in the studio, an equal contributor.
We all seemed to feel that same pressure, the same desire to make the band and the album outstanding. Maybe because Cary had walked into the studio one day, and then he just kept coming. The man brought with him an intense level of focus. When he was in the room, shit got realer than real. What he’d been through… He’d lost someone he loved. And not because of a breakup.Death.His best friend and bandmate had died, and he’d survived it, just barely. He’d become a recluse, maybe because he couldn’t take the things the world had to say about him in the midst of grief.
I could relate, though no one I’d loved like that had died.
We all knew how serious it was, that Cary was in the room. How important it was. If Cary Clarke was showing up for this album, for us, we couldn’t afford to take a moment of it for granted.
Who knew if we might lose him at any second?
Who knew if I might lose Ash, Danica, the band,everythingat any given second?
I was surprised, some days, that I hadn’t fucked it up already. That Ash hadn’t turned on me, kicked me out, fired me, taken it all away.
But he didn’t.
