Ice Steam (Loving All Wrong #3) (21 page)

Pretending not to notice this, I plucked my phone from my purse and feigned texting. Maybe he was just coming to this side to get a corn-on-the-cob or something, considering it was the least touched food on the table and was all the way down on this side.

I was scrolling through old messages on Whatsapp when I felt the arresting weight of his presence behind me, and then a big warm palm on my shoulder, sending heat, searing
heat
, through me.

Forcing himself between my chair and Jake’s, he rumbled, “Can we talk?”

Squeezing my quivering thighs together, I donned a bored expression as I dragged my attention from the phone screen, and transferred it to his achingly beautiful face. “No.”

“No” wasn’t acceptable, apparently, because he knocked a gasp out of me when he dragged my chair with a loud scrape across the floor tiles, silencing everyone at the table.

Shooting up from the chair, I fisted my hands and glared up at him. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?!”

He merely shrugged, as if dragging my chair out and creating a scene was no big deal. “Need to talk, Chino. Losing my mind.”

“You’re really going to do this right now? Right here? In front of everyone?”

“Other people here?” He glanced around with a frown. “Never noticed. Only face I’ve seen since I walked through that door is yours.”

Was he drunk?

I pointed to his blonde who was gaping at us. “You came here with
her
! You forgot that?”

Xavier’s hands went up, palms forward, like I had him at gunpoint. “Didn’t. Didn’t come here with that chick.”

“I
saw
you last night with—”

“Night didn’t end how you think it did. Felt like an asshole when I saw you, so I didn’t stab her. Went straight home instead.”

Well, how to respond to that? On the one hand, I was overjoyed he didn’t sleep with blondie, but I was also pissed he kissed her. And I was doubly pissed about Jessica and Davian’s under-the-table flirting.

I had a lot of pent-up anger in me at the moment and no idea what to do with it, so without thinking, I opened my palm and slapped him across the face.

The sound echoed in the stunned silence of the room, detonating as loud and rattling as a bomb.

Xavier’s jaw clenched, and I wondered what he would do. In the next second, he was reeling me in with a hand to the nape of my neck and smashing his mouth brutally down on mine, unleashing his rage in a series of tongue lashes.

We were both panting when he ferociously ripped his lips away from mine, but that didn’t stop me from slapping him across the face again, harder this time, even though my palm was already on fire.

“Jesus H. Christ,” someone muttered.

“You do not break up with me again!” I shrieked in Xavier’s face. “Ever!”

“Chino,” he growled, thrice as exasperatingly frustrated as I was. Then our mouths were fused again, and we were all but tearing each other’s hair out.

“This film is rated X,” someone else said. “If anyone here is under the age of eighteen, please quietly leave the room.”

“Shit’s our luck that popcorn’s the only thing
not
on the table,” another said.

For me and Xavier, there was no one else in the room. In that moment, I knew exactly who I went to the dinner for, and I knew exactly who had my blood boiling with rage more. The fact that he could break me down like that in front of an audience…

When our lips broke free, I tried to slap him again, but he caught my hand mid-air. “Nuh-uh, Chino.”

Bending at the waist, he grabbed me around my middle and tossed me over his shoulder like a bedtime pillow. “Gonna make you pay for the first two. Right now.”

My protests to his rear were ignored as he began marching out with me. Beating his back was futile.

I gave up fighting and managed to peek through my hair spilling down, as the claw clip had gotten lost somewhere during our mouth war and hair pulling.

Everyone was gawking at us, amused.

Except Davian. He was gripping a fork in his hand, watching Jessica across the table with a suspicious glare.

Jessica, who was staring at us, not amused, but…something else. Because her face, strangely enough, was as white as a ghost.

I
was sated. I was floating. I was hot—no, I was warm.

I was safe. I was smiling. I was asleep—no, I was awake.

The mellifluous sound of adept fingers strumming guitar strings wafted around our white room.

I was lying naked on my stomach, and along my bare posterior, Xavier had laid out his old, battered guitar from the wall. He, too, was nude, propped up on his side, arched over me like a hook, as he strummed the guitar on my back. The peaceful silence between us sweeter than the tranquilizing melody he played.

Considering our last hour and a half, this moment of quietude could be considered the calm after the storm. We’d been so mad at each other that our make-up sex ended up being long, abusive, and punitive.

Like he’d promised, he made me pay for those face slaps.

I had bite marks on my inner thighs—which I hoped as hell would be gone by tomorrow for my next shoot—and Xavier had red welts on his face and fingernail scrapes down his back.

We were good again, and I was content. I didn’t have Davian, but Xavier would fill the gap for now.

“That tat on your wrist mean something?” came that deep, luxurious voice. “Been meaning to ask.”

The hairs on the back of my neck rose, and just like that, the placidity was shattered. Instinctively, I flipped my wrist downward to hide the ink there.

On my inner left wrist was an infinity sign that had two small, red hearts inside each loop. Sometimes I wore wide bracelets to hide it, and sometimes I forgot it was there. It
definitely
meant something, but that’s a something I couldn’t share with the hot, naked rocker beside me.

“Did I say you could talk?”

The strumming continued, even as I felt a shift, then his lips on my shoulder. “Don’t forget the size of my cock, Chino.”

“So, you’re saying because your dick’s monstrous it automatically makes
you
the boss?”

“C’mon, babe,” he said, licking his tongue across my shoulder blade, “you know the answer to that.”

Eyes closed, cheek pressed to a fresh white pillow, I smiled. “You’re unbearably hot when you’re quiet, but excruciatingly annoying when you open your mouth.”

He abruptly stopped strumming and removed the guitar from my back, setting it aside. And my eyes flew open when I felt his full weight on me. This big, weighty ass man stretched out his entire body along mine.

“Bastard!” I shrieked through a giggle.

He channeled my hair to one side so he could nibble on my earlobe. “How you like me now?”

“I just schooled your dick
like a boss
, Xavi. Your weight is child’s play,” I boasted, relaxing and letting his body mold itself against mine.

“Let’s see how long that lasts,” he mumbled. “Now, about the tat?”

“My son,” I lied.

He was silent for a minute, then, “You had the tat artist design that specifically for you, or did you pick it from his books?”

“The artist designed it. Why?”

“Swore I saw said tat somewhere before. Can’t quite remember where.”

I tried to think about tropical beaches and lazy sex to keep my heart calm, because Xavier was right on top of me, and if I stiffened he would feel it. And if my heart-rate suddenly tripped into irregular patterns, he would feel it. He would know I was lying, know I was hiding something.

“Guess the artist ripped off my design.”

He flexed his hips from side to side, and the awareness of his dick hardening against the split of my ass had my stomach curling with desire, my core pulsing, thirsty for a second round.

“Wanna meet your son, Chino.”

“Xavi…” This came out as a moan even though it wasn’t meant to. “I thought we discussed this already?”

“Not saying I wanna swoop in and be the kid’s dad, alright? Just…just feels like I have a jumble of disconnected fragments of you, and no matter how I try to piece them together, nothing fits, ‘cause all I have are lies and half-truths. Need all the pieces. Need
all
of you.”

He pressed a soft kiss to my neck, and when I sighed it hurt, like there were splinters in my heart. Every breath hurt.

“Give me the main piece of the puzzle, Chino. Let me in.”

I didn’t understand it. Why did he still want me if he
knew
all I did was lie to him? Did he care about me
that
much or was he a masochist? Maybe he saw me as a challenge, or a project, something to occupy his free time?

“I’m just not ready to let anyone into Jacob’s life yet, Xavi.” I tried to push up but he pressed me back down to the mattress. “What do you even care about a kid, anyway? You’re a twenty-nine year old rock star for crying out loud.”

“Care about Jacob ‘cause he’s an extension of you.”

“
And
,” I went on, ignoring his words, “it’s not like I have all the pieces to your life either. I’ve only met your sister and your uncouth band-mates. Let’s slow this down a little. Yes?”

Hot lips were at my ear now, breathing sexual heat all the way down to my toes. “You might’ve forgotten all those conversations we’ve had during those six months of text-dating, but I haven’t, ‘cause it’s brought me through a rough patch. Not mad you don’t remember all I’ve told you about the Xanders. And even though this shit isn’t something I like talking about, gonna take the time to tell you again, ‘cause, one: enjoy talking in your ear like this while sniffing your berry-scented hair, and two, ‘cause I want more of you.”

Expelling a breath, he began, “Mom was a French musician. Dad was her Californian producer. They fell in love, Dad migrated to France, they got married and had me and my twin brother, Xhett, who fell from a jungle gym and broke his neck when we were five. Xhett’s death took a toll on Mom, even more so because she was pregnant with Xena, so she quit music, sold our home in Brittany, and we all moved to California.

“Dozen years after that, Mom swore Xhett was visiting her. We’d often hear her talking to herself, and when we questioned who she was talking to, she’d look at us like we were crazy and say, ‘
Xhett. He’s right here. Can’t you see him?’
Till one day, Dad went home and found her in the bathroom with both her wrists slit. Bled to death…”

His voice broke here, and he cleared his throat and tried to play it off, but I knew he was hurting. I felt bad that I’d caused him to dredge up such horrific memories. I hadn’t known. I didn’t remember talking about any of this with him. Was I that awful of a person? Who forgets something as heartbreaking as this?

“She left a note: ‘
I’m going to meet Xhett. You all should come, too.
’”

“Oh, Xav—”

“Mom’s death was too much for Dad,” he cut me off, refusing the sympathy. “She was his lifeline. So when she died, he checked out. By this time Ninety Miles was in the stars, fame and money, but I was barely holding it together. Checked Dad into a mental facility. Took a year before he started showing signs of betterment. When he was released, I got back a nostalgic man. It’s like during his insanity, his mind catapulted him back to when he first met Mom, and he decided to
stay
there. Dad found sanity in the past, ‘cause nothing in the present made sense to him.”

Deep sigh. “Told me he wanted to move back to France, to our old home. So I went there, bought our old house back, gave him whatever he wanted. Still do. Sis and I try to visit him as often as we can, but our lives are on the road.”

“Xavi,” I whispered, trying to peek over my shoulder at him. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“You said that,” he said, voice tight. “Remember? First time I spilled my guts and told you all this?”

His ire was justifiable, and there wasn’t a thing I could say or do to vindicate my utter and complete selfishness, so I chose to tiptoe around it.

“The man with the guitar in the picture on your dresser, is he your grandfather?”

The sigh that left him was long and relenting; as though he’d been coiled up for another fight with me and my unexpected deviation exhausted him. “Great grand. Used to have a blues bar that was the shit back in his day. The guitar was his. Passed it and the bar down to my grandfather, and my grandfather passed them on to my father, who passed them on to me.”

“You have a
blues bar
?” I asked through a giggle.

Xavier’s hips began moving again, as his hand worked its way between my pelvis and the mattress, and moved down to the split between my thighs. “Uh-huh. Hasn’t been open since Granddad, of course, ‘cause Dad was all about Mom and France. But now that we’re taking a break from touring, been thinking about remodeling and putting up the ‘Open’ sign.”

I moaned as his fingers glided easily through my folds. I’d been wet for him since the moment he whispered in my ear. “Hmm…I think…that would be…good.”

“Would it?” His erection was deliciously hard and throbbing behind me.
I wanted it.

Pushing back against his hardness, I mewled, “Yes…so good. It would be so…
good
.”