Page 71 of Fight For Me

I gape at her. “Um, hello? Everly and Fox aren’t the only people in that condo. You know I’m not working right now. Fuck, I stay up half the nights so you can teach me to knit anyhow. Why haven’t you asked me?”

She won’t meet my eyes. “It’s not just that. You know there are stationary cameras set up all the time in the main living areas. This isn’t something I want to end up on TV.”

I gesture around. “Well we’re not in the condo right now. There aren’t permanent cameras in the villa. Take your pill tonight. I’ll make sure nothing happens.”

She looks even more uncomfortable. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“Why the hell not?” I know my anger is irrational, but I can’t seem to rein it in. I tell myself it’s just because I don’t want her to needlessly suffer, but deep down I know there’s a part of me that wants to be the one to help her.

She finally turns her gaze on me, showing off that fire in her eyes. “My mom has to sleep in the same room as me to make sure she can hear me if I get up. You really think that’s a good idea for us?”

My stomach clenches at her words as a stab of yearning hits my chest. Of course she’s right. I’m supposed to be trying to put distance between us, not get even closer. But that doesn’t stop me from wanting it, from wantingher. I want to be the one who helps her find rest. The one who keeps her company when she can’t sleep. And damn it, I want to be the one who gets to hold her at night.

“Fuck,” I snap, frustration slamming me.

“Yeah,” she mutters, rubbing her forehead. She looks defeated now, much more tired than she had when I’d attempted not to watch her dance with the girls. The urge to do something, anything, to help is so strong I can’t fight it.

“You wanna take a walk?”

She looks over at me in surprise. “With you?”

I smile in spite of the storm of emotions raging in my chest. “Yes, Alex. With me.” I gesture my beer bottle towards the sand beyond the patio. “The beach is right there. I wouldn’t mind a break from all this noise.”

She’s still studying me like she’s not exactly sure whether I’m serious or not, so I hold out my arm for her to take. “Come on.”

“Okay,” she relents. “A walk on the beach sounds nice.”

We pause at the edge of the patio to take off our shoes. I roll my pants legs up a few times, probably looking ridiculous, before giving her my arm again. We walk in silence for several minutes, putting space between us and the bar—and between us and the cameras. It gets easier to hear the surf crashing nearby the further we get. The ocean is a black void to our right until the moon comes out from behind a cloud, suddenly illuminating the waves in softly shimmering light.

“Ooh,” Alex breathes, eyes on the water. “That’s pretty.”

She’s a million times more beautiful than the view, but I don’t say that. Instead I slow and drop her arm so I can slip off my blazer. “Let’s sit and look for a minute.” I start to lay my jacket on the side and she gasps.

“Wyatt! That’s Armani!”

“So?”

“You don’t put Armani in the sand!”

I roll my eyes and gesture at her. “Better my jacket than your outfit. This might be Armani but that’s an FEA Threads original.”

She laughs, then winces when I follow through and place the blazer on the sand. But she joins me on the fabric, bringing her knees up towards her chest. I’m thankful that she’s wearing pants—I can imagine only too well what her bare legs would look like bathed in moonlight.

I try to keep my attention on the water, but I can see her casting glances at me out of the corner of my eye. Eventually I turn to her and raise an eyebrow.

She grins, somewhat sheepish. “Sorry. You just…dressed like that…you remind me of…well, of you.”

“I remind you of me?’

She laughs her throaty laugh, eye sparkling in the dim light. “The night I decided I had a crush on you. You were dressed pretty much exactly the way you are now.”

My heart starts pounding harder. “Yeah?”

She laughs again. “You probably don’t remember. We all came up to see you perform in Seattle and then we went out to eat after.”

“Of course I remember that.” It was my first solo professional concert and I’d been beside myself with nerves, particularly since all my uncles were going to be in the audience. The desire to impress the Ransome brothers, who I’d grown up idolizing, was strong.

“Anyhow.” She waves her hand vaguely, like the story she’s telling is unimportant, obviously unaware that I’m hanging on her every word. “We came backstage to see you and you’d undone your tie and taken off your tuxedo jacket. My little teenage heart thought you were the most gorgeous thing I’d ever seen.”