The song for this chapter is Love Somebody by Maroon 5. Very good song for where Leed's head goes, in this chapter...
Let's see what happens back at Ash and Kat's place!
Leed
I think I should try a mantra right now.
ImnotgonnaknockTraceout.
ImnotgonnaknockTraceout.
ImnooooooooooooootgonnaknockTraceout.
ImnooooooooooooootgonnaknockTraceouuuuuuuuuuuutttttttt.
I'm sitting on the couch with an arm around Ashlynn. She's looking down at her hands, worrying one of her gel nails, damaging her nail beneath by tearing it off, and chewing the inside of her cheek. I don't like seeing that. I've seen her nervous when I get too close, but I've never seen her reduced to childish self mutilation. The girl is usually pure grace.
"Goddammit Ash, are you even listening to me!?!? Talk to me!!!! Have you been using again, or was it the first time? Did Leed bust in and stop you? What the fuck happened!?!?!" Trace yells at her.
Fuck the mantra. Violence is a much better idea right now.
I rise and lunge at Trace. I get both hands on him, shoving him way harder than I planned, but he's pissing me off. "Don't fucking yell at her, asshole!!!"
He takes two big steps so he doesn't fall. For a second he's shocked, but then I see the anger I've never seen directed at meâthe kid that suffered a hundred attacks and won't suffer anymore.
Shit. I should have stuck with the mantra. I tense, preparing to defend.
He moves, but Ash is suddenly there, between us. Trace is barely able to stop and he's colliding with us. I push Ash to the side with one hand, trying to swoop her behind me, and step forward to meet Trace, this time on to fend him off with a stiff arm. "Sorry! Trace! Fuck! I'm sorry! Be cool man! The girls..."
"Kat..." Ash says firmly, and that's all it takes to move her sister from where she is glaring at the scene in the corner to Trace's side, pulling his head to look at her.
"Hey. Hey!" She says and he focuses on her. "Stop," she says quietly. "Stop. You are freaking out. You are freaking me out, yelling at Ash. Is this the way it was between you two? No wonder she ran away!"
Trace curses under his breath and whirls away from her, thudding into the kitchen where he slams around in the refrigerator.
Kat looks at us helplessly.
"It's okay, Kat," Ash says woodenly. "He had so so many reasons to be frustrated with me. I lied to him, hid my drugs from him so many times. It's okay."
"It's not okay," I tell her. "It's not okay, Trace!!!" I yell in the kitchen, but I know better than to follow him in there. He needs a moment to cool off. " Get your ass back in here and fucking apologize and let us explain what happened before you start jumping to conclusions!!!!"
To my surprise, he does come back, with a half drunk bottle of water in his hands. He makes his way to Kat, tilts his head, and to my utter shock, a tear falls from his eye. He reaches into her hair. "I'm sorry," he says hoarsely. "You were just so upset when you called me to tell to me the door was busted open. Your fear...and now..."
She pulls him to her, her arms reaching around his back and coming up over his shoulders as she grips him in a fierce hug that could rival one of Mac's. His head drops to her shoulder. "It's okay." She tells him. "It's okay. Let's just calm down, okay?"
He nods on her shoulder. After a long moment of calming down, he releases her.
He turns to us, and I try not to visibly tense as he comes near. Ashlynn slips around me and stands in front of him. He puts his hands on her shoulders, bites his lip, looks at the floor, then meets her eyes. "I'm sorry I yelled," he says. "I can't do this again, hon. You have to tell me the truth."
I want to tell Trace to get his damn hands off her, to stop calling her hon, to stop acting like the spouse of an addict. It's not his fucking place, anymore. But it's not mine, either, to tell him these things. I never understood their fucked up thing. I can't even imagine marrying someone I'm over the fucking moon about, and Trace married Ash when he was in love with someone else. But it's always been clear to me...Trace loves Ashlynn. I guess when she cracked her skull in front of him, she cracked his hard heart and made a space for herself there. It's not a tender, romantic love; it's a fierce, loyal, protective kind of love. The way I love Mac, without the fun in the mix.
I think about Mac and about Adam, and how he gives me the space to love my sister. So I stay back, and give my band brother the space to love Ash and the space for Ash to respond. It's part of her recovery, to stand up for herself. I'm hoping she won't run from him, even though his brand of love for her is overbearing. As much as I want to fucking make him respect her, she has to do that herself or it's not real respect.
"I will tell you the truth, Trace," she says calmly. "But you have to listen."
"You're right. I'm sorry. I'll listen," he nods, but he doesn't move. He just waits, with his hands on her shoulders, like he's afraid she's going to run.
It hurts me. For her. But also for him. I realize he knows an entirely different side of Ash. A side I hope to God he never has to see again.
Suddenly, I'm quaking inside at the realization that I nearly summoned that side of her to the surface today. I rolled up into her scene like the Lion and pawed around and ripped open old wounds for her and her ex and made her bleed and hurt so much that she wanted to use because of it. I was her trigger today, but what would have happened if I hadn't followed her home and become her lifeline? Would she have resisted the temptation? Or would she have asked someone else for drugs? Someone who would have had no qualms about giving them to her?
It's not that hard to find drugs in LA. Hell, she might even have her old dealers' numbers still memorized. Fuck, I think she used to buy from my guy...
If she used today, it would have been a direct consequence of the bullshit I put her through. Ashlynn being Ashlynn, I bet she had a coping plan to get through that meeting with her exâkeep it light, show him only what she wanted him to see, not delve into the pastâand I blew holes in that.
Exactly the kind of shit I was worried aboutâmessing with her head and her sobriety.
Seeing Trace's face, I see that clearly now. I made her unstable and he's terrified of unstable Ash and what she will do to her life and his.
I'm shit at this. I'm shit at this, but I don't know how to leave her alone. I physically can't.
I've got to do better than today, because I won't be the guy who fucks her up. Ever. And I won't be the coward that walks away from the fear of it, either.
So what the hell does that even mean?
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
Is this how it happens? It just sneaks the fuck up on you like this, and you don't even get to decide?
I realize my hands are shaking. I clench my fists to stop them. I sit down abruptly on the couch, wiping with my forearm at the sweat that has suddenly sprung up on my forehead. Ash, sensing the movement, turns from Trace's grip, though he keeps a hand on her.
Her blue-green eyes take it all inâthe sweat, the clenched fistsâand she pats Trace's hand on her shoulder and walks away from him, coming to sit by me on the sofa. I lean forward, unclenching my fists and putting my hands on my knees to stop them from shaking. I keep my eyes on the ground in front of me. I can't look her in the face. I'm afraid she's going to see it written all over me.
I am not ready for this.
She leans down, her long curtain of waves brushing my hand as she tries to catch my eye. When I don't look at her, she says. "You okay?"
I take her hand, and nod, but I still don't look at her.
"You don't look okay." she prods. "You look...like you are going to be sick."
"I'm fine," I say hoarsely.
I am so not fine.
I am fucked, that's what I am.
So fucked.
"Ash," Trace says softly, but firmly. "He's fine. He's just weirdly sensitive." Trace slaps me on the back. "Sorry for being a hothead. We cool, man?"
I look up at him. He raises his eyebrows at me, alarmed. "What the fuck, man? You look pale as shit. Just like you did the first time we performed as headliners, to a stadium crowd."
Fuck this. I'm Leed Lawson. The Lion. The Frontman. I'm not going to let a little thing like the possibility that I might be falling in love with Ashlynn Ballard rattle me.
I let go of Ash's hand,rake my hand through my hair, curse because it barely exists anymore, and throw myself back onto the couch into a completely false relaxed pose, then reach to dab Trace up.
"I'm fine. We cool. Sit the fuck down and let's talk like people and not snarl at each other like goddamn animals."
Trace nods, and sits down on an ottoman. Kat claims the chair behind but his eyes are still on Ash, waiting for her truth. She flushes again, and I know exactly what the flush means this time.
It's shame.
Seeing her ashamed of what happened today?
It breaks my fucking heart. It was my fault and anyway, she didn't use. Why should she have to confess every craving, every near miss to everyone in her life? Even addicts deserve privacy.
I pull her to me by her waist, tip her chin up to look me in the eyes. "All this drama, just because I grew a conscious and decided not carry weed around you when I'm hanging out with you."
She blinks, surprised at my words. I shoot a casual look between Kat and Trace. "The weed was mine. I flushed it, and tossed my pipe into the dumpster out back. I felt weird because Ash and I were going to hang out today, that's all. The door was me too...just..." I struggle for a reasonable explanation and, unable to find one, I shrug. "You know, just me being me. She was upstairs, taking a moment. I wasn't about waiting."
"Oh!" The relief in Kat's voice is evident. She pats Trace on the shoulder, swooping around him to see his face. "See? I knew there was an explanation."
Trace looks a little sheepish. "Okay, I get that. But don't you think some damn body should have let Kat know about the door and the change of plans? She thought somebody broke in. And then when Ash didn't show up for their dinner plans and she couldn't get her on the phone, she freaked out and thought something really bad had happened...I was freaked out, too. And then when I came in to search the house, I saw the shake on the toilet and I could smell the green, obviously. I called Cam and he said their brunch didn't end on a positive note and she left crying...what the fuck was I supposed to think?"
He looks desperately at Ash. "I thought it was a fucking terrible idea for you to see Cam anyway. I was worried he might upset you from the beginning...and he was so damn cagey when I talked to him on the phone...he wasn't telling me the whole story. Just like a fucking doctor. Hedging his words. I lost my patience with him too, and told him I was going to kick his ass the next time I saw him." Trace huffs and rubs a fist in his open palm. "Told him it might be tonight, if I found you messed up from what had happened with him."
"You did not really say those thing to Cam did you?" Ash scolds.
Trace shrugs nonchalantly. Kat rubs his shoulders from behind and bites her lip, furrows her brows in discomfort at us. "He did. With a lot of fuck's and fucking's thrown in."
"Oh, Trace, why can't you behave?" Ash moans, and I grin to hear her totally motherly tone with him. That's the same kind of tone Tam uses with me sometimes, but Ash never talks to me with that way. That girl might want to take care of me, but she definitely doesn't think she's my mother.
"What was I supposed to do, Ash? What went down with you guys the first round was fucking tragic but nothing can change what happened. You both went your own way. You called him to apologize for shit you did when you were high, he accepted your apology...fine, I get that. That should have been the end of it. Why's he even calling you up to have brunch while he's in LA, stirring shit up? Doesn't he have a goddamn fiancee? He should just leave you alone and let you get on with your life."
I sling at hand at my brother. "Thank you. Now you're talking sense."
Ashlynn gives me a side-eye. "What happened to all that stuff you said earlier about healing and closure?"
"Oh. Well. It's like this: when I'm alone with you, sensitive me with the third eye takes over and says poetic shit. But then I get around this bad ass, and his tough-talk makes so much more sense," I grin and throw my arm around her, jostling her. "See how that works? I'm a lover and a fighter, baby."
"Lover?" Kat squeals gleefully. "Oh my god, did you guys do it today?"
Ash gasps. "No!"
"Did you make out?" she presses.
"No!"
"Your lips can lie, but that hickey on your neck tells truth, Sunshine," I say smugly.
Ash's eyes widen. She gets a small smile and her fingers fly to the spot where I sucked her neck, remembering how good it felt. Then she flushes, and her whole hand clamps to her neck, like she's trying to hide it.
There's no mark. I'm neither an inexperienced fifteen year-old nor some territorial douche.
I sex models for Chrissakes.
I know how to pleasure a woman's skin without leaving ugly bruises. I only leave traces of my love-making if the girl wants the souvenir, and I have no idea how Ash feels about that yet. She loved the feeling on her skin, but she's modest, so obviously I wouldn't leave her with a hickey on her neck.
"Just playing, baby. I would never mark you where people can see." I assure her.
Something changes in Ash's expression. Her nose pinches and the skin around her eyes tighten. She blinks rapidly and looks away from me.
I'm still learning Ash, but I know girls' expressions in general and that's the Imma-bout-to-cry look.
"Hey, whatâ" I reach for her arm as she leaps up from the couch, and puts her hands to her head.
"This is crazy!" she hisses as she paces. "This whole thing is crazy. You didn't just flush your weed to hang with me for a fun day, and we didn't make out. Not like you are making it sound. Everything that happened today was...so much more than you are making it sound. It's like...truth bends to whatever you want it to be, Leed. I just want to tell the truth, before I don't even know myself what happened today!"
She's shouting like she's angry, but I see through it. She's shouting to keep from crying. I upset her.
I rub my jaw, scrambling for what to do next.
Fuck. This caring about somebody more than yourself isn't easy. No wonder Trace and Adam are always hella tense.
"Ashlynn, you're right. It was more," I promise. Jesus, Sunshine. You have no idea how much more it really feels like to me right now. "I hi-jacked this whole conversation and turned it into a performance. It's a bad habit of mine. But I guess this is not my story to tell, huh?"
"No." she still looks like she might cry. And run. "No," She repeats.
I stare at her yoga top, remembering how she tried to run earlier. She freaked out and shot off my lap when I tried to get underneath her top earlier.
It's strange, that with a banging body like hers, she never shows it off in sports bras or bikinis. If she shows any midriff at all, it's just an inch or two around her waist, never a tiny top like Mac or Kat wear or low shorts that show her hips.
No, she says. Over and over. Always telling me no.
Good god. Somebody, somewhere, sometime didn't hear it. No, that's not right. Heard it and didn't care. Crashed right through her "no's" and did...whatever is putting that look on her face right now.
My mouth goes dry and I swallow down a bitter taste. I know she's done things she wasn't proud of. I feel sure she's had sex with men she wasn't hot to have sex with, but whose drugs she wanted. But the thought of them abusing her? Taking her consent away?
What I said about marks people can't see. That's what upset her.
Christ. What kind of scars does she hide? What bastard put them there?
The thought makes me feel weak.
Not weak like I might be sick.
Not weak with fear or uncertainty.
Weak like I could lose all self-discipline.
Weak like I could actually become the lion I front on-stage.
Weak like I could lose my mind and kill.
But now is not the time to be weak. Right now, I need to be strong. Right now, I need to find a way to help Ash feel strong.
We're staring at each other. I struggle to remember where we are in the conversation, so I can respond right.
"Okay, I hear you," I say slowly. "We'll do it your way."
I pat the couch beside me. Slowly, very slowly, she sits and leaves a foot between us.
Kat is still rubbing Trace's shoulders. He's looking between us with deep suspicion.
"What the hell is going on with you two?" he asks. He glares at me. "What the fuck does she mean, it was more than you are making it sound? I swear to fuck Leed, I warned you. If you're messing with herâ"
"Calm down, Trace. You aren't Ashlynn's goddamn chastity belt and I have no intention of perpetrating a fangirl-fuck-and-forget, or a friends-with-benefits on her, anyway. Get your mind out of the gutter." I turn to Ashlynn. "It's your show, Sunshine. Say what you gotta say."
She looks at Kat, mostly. A little at Trace, as she explains.
"You have to remember that Leed wasn't there. Back when I got hurt. He didn't see. He didn't understand about Cam. That Cam is a good person who tried very hard to help me. But I guess, somewhere along the way, he picked up the bare bones. Cameron's name, and that he left me and went to med school after my accident. So Leed...well, Leed is just one of those guys that always comes along at the exact right moment. He has...kismet on his side. He happened to see Cam and I out at brunch, and he...invited himself. When he realized who Cam was...it was a...Leed-like conversation. He was...roaring a little bit at Cam, because in his mind, Cam was a bad guy that left me when I needed him. You can imagine..." she smiles at me. "But the take-away was that without even meaning to, he sort of helped Cam and I toward closure. But for me...I never really felt the break-up before. I used drugs not to feel it. So it all hit me at once. I left the restaurant feeling like...feeling like Cam just broke up with me, actually."
Kat springs up from her chair, rushes the couch and wedges between us, giving me a "Move your butt, Leed!" and Ash and much nicer, "Aw, Sissy. I'm so sorry."
Ash kind of sobs-laughs. "Thank you. I've needed that hug, all day."
"Hey!" I tap my chest. "I hugged you. Very thoroughly. Particularly during our savasana. I remember it being...very therapeutic."
"Yes, but not the same as a sister-hug," Ash says sympathetically, over Kat's shoulder.
"So I'm chopped liver?" I smile at her.
"You're a stupid boy," Kat throws over her shoulder. "A stupid boy broke her heart."
I slide off the couch and slightly to the left, resting on the floor against the armrest while Kat hugs Ash.
For the first time, Trace and I give each other a new look, heretoafter coined the These-Sisters-Look. It's kind of a lips-tucked-back-afraid-to-smile-tiny-headshake-even-tinier-eyeroll that basically means: These sisters, man. They can be girly as fuck but we still dig 'em.
Ashlynn disentangles herself from Kat. "I ran home. Leed followed. I was upstairs crying, really upset. So he busted through the front door. He was asking me to let him into the room, and I...I was hurting. So bad. Over Cam. I just wanted something to make it stop hurting."
"Oh my god," Kat puts a hand to her mouth. "So you guys did have sex?"
Ash makes an impatient sound. "No."
"That's when you made out," Trace glares at me.
"Naw man, you think I'd take advantage like that?" I say, even growlier than Ashlynn.
"Well, what the fuck happâOh." Trace's expression goes from irritated to a disappointed dad look. He just looks at Ashlynn, waiting.
"I asked Leed for weed." She said quietly.
"Actually, you didn't." I corrected her. "You asked me to help you make the pain go away. We both knew you wanted weed, but you never actually asked me to give it to you. I dumped it immediately, so it was a non-issue, but are sure what would have happened if I had put it in your hand and told you to fire it up right there in front of me? Because I don't think you would have smoked it."
She looks at me like the thought hadn't occurred to her. She stares into the distance a minute. "I don't know. I wanted it, but I guess I knew you wouldn't give it to me. If you had, I don't know if I would have smoked it or not. Probably not, but it might have had more to do with you watching than what I really wanted," she says, and I think that's very honest. And that's the rock bottom core of coping with addiction, I'm pretty sure. Not deluding yourself.
Trace rubs a hand over his face. "Fuck. So what happens now, Ash?"
She smiles at him. "Same thing that happens every day, Trace. I cope. I did cope. Leed took me to a meeting. Then we did yoga. Then we ate break-up ice cream. Now I feel...stronger. It's not the first time I have wanted drugs since detox. It's not an everyday thing, no. But some days are harder than others."
Kat tackles her again, hugging her tight. I watch them, feeling a little sad, wishing I had my own sister right now. God knows, I need her. Who the fuck else but Mac could understand the insanity that I'm feeling right now, staggering around on the love cliff, wondering if the next blast of feels is gonna push me off the edge to my death or if I'm going to learn to fly?
Kat is still hugging Ash. "I'm so glad you didn't get high today, Ash. I'm so afraid if you do, even once, I'll lose you again."
Ash bends her head next to Kat's. "I won't. You won't."
Trace clears his throat. "Okay, so it sounds like a bad morning but a better evening. So what do you need Ash? From us? To help you out, support you through this?"
She shrugs. "I'm okay. Staying busy helps, and I have busy mornings for the rest of the week with Ravi and some other personal appointments and stuff. Maybe it would be nice not to be alone at night for the next couple of days."
"I won't go to Trace's. I promise. We'll have girls nights," Kat says automatically.
"Thank you."
Trace nods. "What can I do? I got nothing, since we are on hiatus. Want to have lunch tomorrow while Kat is at school?" he looks at Kat a little hesitantly but she just smiles and nods at him.
"Sure," Ashlynn says, "But the main thing I need from you is to try not to yell at me when something goes sideways for me, okay?"
Trace closes his eyes, like in regret and swallows hard. "I'm really sorry, hon. You scared me. I reacted badly, and I'm sorry. Trust is going to take time. I'm trying."
"I know. I'm trying to, Trace. Every day. No one wants me to stay sober more than me. I have a new life. I want to keep it."
Watching Ashlynn's face break into a soft smile and her eyes seek mine when she says that, breaks something lose inside of me. I'm so proud of her right now. I can feel her beauty and it has nothing to do with her perfect features and body.
Yeah.
I am so very fucked.
ââââââââââââ
"Fifteen minutes and we are out of here so they can have some sister time," Trace points a finger at me as Kat is trying to push him up the stairs to her room. She whispers something in his ear, and the rock star face descends as he listens. "Thirty minutes and we are out of here," he corrects and he practically drags her up the stairs.
I lean my head back on the couch, banging it lightly as I stare at the ceiling. It's bad enough I had to hear Ben and Tam have sex last week. Now, I have to bear downstairs witness while TrayKat slap and tickle right above my head?
Ashlynn is sitting beside me on the couch, looking at the ceiling too. "Sorry, they don't usually do this. They usually take it to Trace's house."
I take her by the hand. "Got any tea? Something that's calming? Depressive, even? You got any of the kind that monks drink?" I joke as I pull her to the cute little kitchen and start to fill the teapot.
She rolls her eyes at me. "Leed, you are really starting to give me a complex. I feel...guilty or something."
I put the kettle on to boil lean back against the counter and pull her to me by the hips. "I just have one question for you. You wanna be with me? Eventually, I mean? When the connection is right?"
She doesn't blush this time. She puts her arms around my neck and gives me that smile that lights up my world. "Yeah," she says simply. "If you wanna be with me and only me, I mean, for right now..."
Right now? Right now, this girl is all I can see as far as I can see. It's like my vision can only focus on her distance. But I don't tell her that, because I don't trust this. I don't know how this works. I've never done this. And the last thing I want to do is rush in with hasty words and end up disappointing her.
I run my hands up her sides, lightly, careful not to disturb her top. "I'm not hooking up with anybody else, Ash. Not since before Tam's wedding. And I won't be. I promise. I want to...try, with you, okay?"
Her head falls forward in an embarrassed, breathy laugh, and then she raises it to meet my eyes. "Okay. Cool. But..." she hesitates. "What about Tam and Ollie and your living situation?"
"I've got to work some things out there and get on some kind of better routine, but I'm close stepping away from staying there every night. I'm actually going to have Ollie at my house for the first time in a couple of days. Will you come over and help me out?"
I didn't think her smile could get any bigger but it does. "I'd love to. Tam will be cool with that?"
Damn. That smile. No way am I wiping it off her face. "Yeah. She's coming around." She will be. Ben seems like he can reason with her better than I can. He'll help work it out, I'm sure.
"Okay, I'd love to help you take care of Ollie."
"Listen, I have something special in mind that I want to do with you, a special first date, but it's a thing that will take some...finesse. Between transitioning back to my house and making that happen, it might be a few weeks before we start this dating thing, okay?"
"Leed, you don't have to do something crazy..."
"It's not crazy," I promise her. "It's...magical. I want to make it a memory, okay? I've never done this romance thing, but I'm not gonna try anymore sexy stuff right now." I rock her side to side by the hips. "We can take it slow. First date slow."
Her smile gets wider, then drops altogether. She bites her lip. "Shit."
"What?"
"Well, I forgot something." Her face is scrunched up, her eyes closed like she doesn't want to tell me. "I have...a blind date coming up. Two dates actually."
"Funny," I say.
She opens one eye. "Not so much."
"You're serious?" I drop my hands from my hips. "I've been killing myself trying to get up next to you, and begging you to hang tight for us to get our timing right and you're searching for a love connection on Tinder?"
"No," she grabs my arms. "No! Riley wanted to set me up with his money manager's son. Kat and Trace would not stop harassing me until I said yes... "
"Cancel it," I growl.
"Ok, I will...but the other one...is not quite as easy to cancel..."
"Why?" I demand.
She rolls her eyes. "Matt del Marco set it up. Its supposed to be a triple date or something with Trace and Kat, Street and some girl he's seeing and this friend of Street's, that is apparently another one of Matt del Marco's tribe of casually adopted children. It's really all just a way for Matt to try to get Trace and Street on better terms. Kat is in on it, and I promised to help too..."
I grip the counter. "Jesus Christ. Matt fucking del Marco...that man never takes no for an answer. You'll never get out of it."
The kettle whistles and I reach over, moving it off the burner. Ashlynn is standing in front of me with her head bowed. I feel like a shit. I don't own her, and until today, we had nothing between us for her to even hold onto except some vague pleas I've made to her.
"Hey, it's okay. Really," I tell her. "Go on the date. Hell, go on both of them. The more I think about it, the more I think it's a great idea. You'll go have two totally awkward, non-magical blind dates and you'll realize how hot for me you really are, and how much chemistry we have, and you'll jump me before we even get to our date destination..."
She slaps me on the chest in the most caressing way. She searches my face. "You don't mind? Really? Cause it seems weird. I've been telling you I don't want something casual, and now you're saying you want to date me and I'm going out with other guys..."
"It's fine. When we get to the romance part and we're ready for..."I gulp, "labels," I whisper like they are dirty word, "then obviously I won't be cool with you stepping out on me with some dweebs but for now...play the field baby. Just remember I'll be at home with my fingers wrapped around my dick,thinking of you and praying that your Pearly Gate stays closed to all other dates but me..."
She puts a hand over my mouth. "I'm not going to sleep with anyone on a blind date. If I didn't sleep with you after that incredibly sexy yoga today, you should know...I'm not...I'm not..."
"You're not ready for sex right now," I say simply. "You had a rough time the last couple of years? Some bad experiences?" I coax gently.
She swallows. "Yes, but I'm not ready to talk about them with you, either. Not today. Not after everything else..."
"That's okay." I cup the back of her head and make her look into my eyes. "You know what happened to Mac, right? In Portland? And that she has PTSD from that?"
She nods.
"Then you have to know, I get it. Remember what I said at the bar, when you told me you wished I had never seen you drugging?"
"You said we have to play the hands we are dealt." She whispers.
"This is the same kind of thing. We'll play it together, okay?"
She wraps her arms around me tight, laying her head on my shoulder, and I return the embrace. I love it. It feels so good. So right.
"Sunshine, I think we have the best hugs, and it really hurts me that you like Kat's better."
"I don't like them better. Sometimes a sister-hug is just the right balm, you know?"
"Okay, I can accept that, actually." I could use a sister hug myself, right about now, because as good as I feel in Ashlynn's arms, I know once I leave her, I'm going to be freaking out.
Cause I'm really out of my depth here. My heart is writing checks with Ashlynn that I don't know if the rest of me can cover. I just know, this girl makes me want to be the man she smiles at like this and hugs like this and looks at with trusting eyes.
She finally releases me, plants a sweet kiss on my cheek and pours the tea. She turns around with the little pot of honey, catching a drip on the edge and sucking it off her finger.
"Just a little drizzle of honey, right? No cream?"
She remembers how I like my tea a little sweet, even though I hardly sweeten anything else.
This girl. She's a goddamn keeper, that's what she is. I never wanted a keeper. Ever.
But Ashlynn? Gorgeous in every molecule. Smart as a whip. A giving heart. Strong in spirit.
A Queen.
You don't throw away Queens.
Fuck me. You keep them.
Oh my. Leed has it bad. Does it surprise you? Or it in keeping with Leed's impulsive, sensitive character to realize he's falling in love and also be freaking about it.
Funny Chapter next. Leed tries to call Mac buts ends up confessing his love revelation to Adam. We'll see what advice Preacher has for him!