Gravity Happens (Forcing Gravity) (39 page)

“How the he
ll would you know how he kisses?” Ethan growled in my ear before he started sucking on my earlobe.

“Yeah, Loga
n,” Ellie said, sounding somewhat affronted. “Tell us how you know how my boyfriend kisses.”

“Shit,” Garrett hissed under his breath.

I was well-aware that I was frozen in place with my mouth hanging open. “Um.”

“Yeah, that’s not an answer,” TJ piped up, and I wasn’t sure how he had anything to do with our conversation.
The girl he was with giggled.

Garrett sighed. “Logan and I sort of hooked up last summer.”

“Sort of hooked up? What does that mean?” Ellie asked, and Garrett squeezed her hand.

“What the fuck?!” Ethan asked, practically exploding out of his seat as he tossed me to the side and
lunged for his brother.

“Dude, back off,” Garrett warned, and rightfully so.

He’d packed on close to twenty pounds of muscle in the past six weeks in preparation for his reprisal role as Lucas, the badass fallen angel
.
He had to go shirtless a lot, so the lean muscle he usually sported wasn’t enough for the part. He had to get all jacked up, and because of that, he could definitely kick his brother’s ass. Not that he actually would, but still.

“Ethan!” I called out to him before I kicked off my shoes and
physically went after him. I could not navigate a moving limo in four inch heels.

I
wrapped my arms around his waist and tugged him down to a nearby seat, sitting on his lap. Below me his breathing was ragged and heavy. I placed my hands on his chest and looked him straight in the eye.

“We kissed in an elevator and a little more in his hotel room when he was in Miami, but then we both realized what a colossal mistake it was and stopped before things went too far. It didn’t mean anything.”

I wasn’t sure why Ethan was so riled up.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked, so quietly.

I shook my head. “I didn’t tell anyone. We were trying to keep it a secret.”

“Word to the wise, if you want your secrets kept, don’t get Logan Kessler drunk,” Garrett called out good naturedly. But just for good measure, I glared at him. And he laughed.
Jerk.

But so did Ellie, so that was good. At least she wasn’t mad.
We’d hooked up before they’d even met.

I looked
back at Ethan who was pouting, so I kissed him on the cheek. “Don’t pout, gorgeous,” I told him. “It’s your birthday. It’s totally not allowed. We’ll find you a really hot girl to take home okay?”

He looked up at me, eyes wide, then he grinned goofily. “I have a really hot girl sitting on my lap.”

“She’s not going home with you,” I told him.

He leaned in closer
to me. “But she’s sharing my hotel room, so she sort of has to go home with me.”

I was suddenly very aware of Ethan’s hand snaking up under my dress and grasping my thigh. Then before I knew what he was doing, he had me straddling his lap, and all I could do was stare into his deep blue eyes that had me captured there in that moment with him.

Then the limo jerked to a halt and everyone started to pile out. Everyone except Ethan and me.

“Five minutes, Gare,” he
told his brother who paused as he was exiting the limo.

“Ethan, don’t,” Garrett warned.

“Why, you did?” Ethan responded sarcastically, and Garrett shot him a look.

“Don’t go there, dude.”

“Just give me five fucking minutes,” Ethan growled, and Garrett mumbled something unintelligible in response before he ducked out of the limo.

As soon as everyone was gone, Ethan looked back at me.

“Happy birthday,” I told him, and he looked up at me with such longing.

Had I been sober, I never would have been engaging in what I was doing with him, because I knew how he felt about me. I knew I was leading him on.

“I love you, Lo.”

“I love you too, E.
”

Then he kissed
me, pulling me down so there were only strips of fabric separating me from the hardness between his thighs, and had I been any more sober, I would have seen red flags everywhere, but such as it was, my head was swimming. So there, in the back of a limo with tinted windows, so the hundreds of people passing by couldn’t see in, I made out with my best friend.

“Five minutes is up,” Garrett called into the limo a time later, and I broke away from Ethan.

“We’ll meet you inside,” Ethan barked at him, and Garrett slammed the door.

Ethan
glanced up at me then with a hunger in his eyes that I’d only seen once before on another guy’s face.

“I needed another shot,” I murmured, as I crawled off
of Ethan’s lap.

His eyes narrowed. “You’re kidding me, right?”

“What?” I asked, trying not to get distracted as I poured clear liquid into a glass. I wasn’t sure what it was, but I didn’t care.

“You were seriously
just thinking about
him
while you were kissing me? That’s fucked up, Lo.”

I slammed the shot back and wished I hadn’t. I was pretty sure it was gin, and it was disgusting.
Then I turned on Ethan and glared at him.

“I’m sorry if I’m thinking about him tonight, but we only broke up
like five weeks ago, and I miss him. Okay? But I’m here with you, so cut me some fucking slack, will you?”

I started to leave the limo, but Ethan grabbed my hand and held me back. I turned to look at him and saw the pain in his eyes.

“You’re never going to love me like you love him, are you?” he asked, and it broke my heart.

Tears started to prick the backs of my eyes
, because even though I knew exactly what he was saying, I couldn’t break his heart. Because I did love him – just not how he wanted me to love him.

“Ethan, I can’t answer that right now,” I told him
. The last thing I wanted to do was say something I’d regret.

He took a deep breath. “Fine. Pass me that bottle?”

I handed him a different bottle than the one I’d drunk from because I wouldn’t subject even my worst enemy to that crap.

Ethan took a few swigs, and then handed the bottle to me. “Here’s to forgetting about those we can’t have,” he said, and
even though we weren’t on the same page, I knew exactly how he felt.

Camera flashes met us as soon as we stepped out of the limo, and I hid in Ethan’s chest as he ushered me inside. The paparazzi had been relentless since Jase and I
had broken up, but ever since the incident at the club where I’d punched Chloe, they’d gotten shots of Ethan and me coming and going, and even though he wasn’t famous, we’d been named as a couple several times.

“Logan! Over here!”

“Logan, smile. Come on, just give me one smile. Let the world see you’re over Jason.”

“Logan! Are you and Ethan together now?”

“How does Jason feel about you moving on so quickly?”

“Leave her alone,” Ethan demanded, his tone murderous, as we stepped into the hotel and away from the flashbulbs.

“You don’t have to respond to them,” I told him. “It just eggs them on.”

“I don’t give a shit,” he said softly, as he looked down at me. Then he leaned forward and kissed my forehead. “I hate that they think they can get a piece of you.”

I shrugged. “It’s their job.”

“Yeah, but do they have to be so aggressive?” he argued.

I sighed. “I keep waiting for them to just leave me alone. I’m not dating anyone famous. I’m not famous. Why do they care?”

He grinned. “Because you’re hot,” he said, and I smacked his chest.

I was glad we’d gone back to being playful. I’d been afraid our moment of clarity in the limo would change things, but Ethan, ever resilient, wasn’t going to let that happen.

And as soon as we met up with our friends, we hit the dance floor. Ethan’s
hands were on my waist, as I tried to stay upright in my shoes. When I swayed into him for the third time and he laughed, he decided we should go to the bar and get something to drink. I figured a bottle of water might be good since consuming any more alcohol was out of the question for me.

Ethan took my hand and led me to the closest bar. I was sweaty as hell, and so was he, but he looked sexy. I was afraid I looked gross. As he squeezed through the crowd and attempted to get the bartender’s attention, I clung to his back, my arms
hooked around his waist, and looked around.

“Two waters,” I heard him say, and as soon as he did, I froze. He turned around and looked down at me, but my eyes were glued to the end of the bar
, so he followed my gaze. “Shit.”

“I need a shot,” I mumbled,
as the tears threatened to overtake me.

Without a word, Ethan turned back to the bartender and ordered four shots of Patron.

And that was probably the biggest mistake of the night, because as soon as the shot was in my hand, Jase looked up from where he was standing at the end of the bar next to his best friend Freddie, and locked eyes with me. I looked to see if there were girls with them, but they seemed to be alone. I thought it was ironic that they were in Vegas the same weekend we were.

I
tried to ignore them as I took the shot back, but when my gazed found center again, Jase was still staring at me.

A
s Ethan handed me another shot, I knew I needed to do something that would permanently push Jase into my past. The longer I held onto him, the longer I’d hurt. But if I let myself go and did what I could to erase him from my mind and my memories, maybe I wouldn’t continue to hurt so much all the time.

“Shit,” Ethan muttered next to me.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, looking over at him. He looked like he’d seen a ghost.

I looked up just in time to
see Nora squeeze in between Jase and Freddie and grab a shot from the bar. She downed it as Ethan and I stared at her. Then for some reason, maybe because we were staring at her and her brother was staring at us, her gaze found Ethan’s.

“Now, I need a shot,” he said, as he tilted one back.

And as I looked at him, looking at her, I wondered if he’d trivialized his feelings for her. Or maybe he didn’t realize how far he’d fallen for her. I might have been who he was holding onto, who he thought he wanted to be with, but somewhere along the way, she’d changed his mind about who he really wanted. And he gave her up in a second because of me.

“You should go talk to her,” I insisted.

“Why?” he asked harshly as he slammed back his second shot.

“Because you miss her.”

“No, I don’t,” he argued, and I knew he was lying.

“Fine,” I said, taking a stand. “Then kiss me.”

“What?” He turned to me with a look adjacent to horror on his face.

“What? You don’t want to kiss me? You were all about it an hour ago. What gives?”

“Logan, what are you doing? You really want to kiss me in front of Jase?”

I crossed my arms in front of me. “That’s what you care about? Jase’s feelings? I sincerely doubt that.”

I looked up in time to see Nora turn away and disappear into the crowd, and I knew Ethan saw her too, because I caught the glimpse of yearning in his eyes before he turned back to me. I wondered if he noticed that Freddie went after her.

“Look, I don’t like the guy, but I don’t exactly want him to come o
ver here and try to kick my ass,” Ethan said when he turned back to me. “It’s not like he’d succeed, but I wouldn’t want him to embarrass himself or anything.”

“E, you’re wasted, there is no way you could take him.”

“You want to bet?” he challenged, and before I could stop him, his hands were cupping my face and his lips were on mine.

I stood there stock still, not sure what to do, but I could feel Jase’s eyes on me. And then, right before he ripped Ethan and me apart, I could sense his presence.

He reached out and slammed his fist into Ethan’s jaw, and although Ethan reeled back from the force, he turned right back to Jase and smirked at him. Jase was practically hyperventilating he was breathing so hard, his nostrils flaring, and his fists clenched tight at his sides.

“I thought that might get your attention, asshole,” Ethan said, goading him.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing with her?” Jase growled.

“What you’d be doi
ng if you were still with her, if you hadn’t cheated.”

Jase glared at him with murder in his bright green eyes, but he didn’t
respond.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” Ethan said, rubbing his jaw that was staring to swell. “You know you fucked up, asshole. You didn’t realize what a good thing you had
, and you gave it up for one night of sex with a whore.”

And just like that the fight went out of Jase. I could see defeat written all over his face. And then he looked right at me.
“You told me you weren’t with him.”