Rhythm, Chord & Malykhin (21 page)

I
slept
my way to Dubai, and somehow managed to make it to London without speaking more than twenty words to Sacha. Most importantly, I didn’t fall asleep on his legs and he didn’t nap on mine. When we caught our connecting flight, it turned out that he was sharing a seat with a stranger so I sat with my brother and Gordo instead. Gordo—who had heard the same conversation I had—didn't say a word. It was the red Starburst he gave me later on that really showed his sympathy.

When we finally landed in London, the promoter for the tour drove us in a Sprinter van to a hotel where we'd be staying for the night. A new tour bus would be picking us up the next day.

I made an effort to stand and sit away from my gray-eyed friend. My mood was pretty rotten, and I felt pretty groggy from the jetlag. As excited as I'd been about going to Europe, I didn't feel like doing a freaking thing on our first day off. Everyone was so relieved to be on land again, and I definitely wasn't going to be the party pooper in the bunch bringing everybody else down.

If my good mood were a raft named Gaby, it seemed like it was on the verge of sinking.

Eli had waved me off when I got settled in my room and said he'd be back for me later, regardless of whether I wanted to go somewhere or not. He knew something was bothering me, but he was smart enough to know not to ask about it until later. Even though he'd inherited the Barreto temper from our mom, bits and pieces of it were still etched into my chromosomes. He was well aware of what to expect when I was in a slump.

What I didn't take into consideration was that Sacha had gotten to know me as well.

When a knock sounded on my door a couple of hours after we'd been dropped off, I didn't bother asking who was there because I'd assumed it was Eliza. Only it wasn't.

"You didn't ask for the password," Sacha said with a frown when the door was opened.

I shrugged and held it wider for him to come in. "I thought you were Eli," I answered him simply.

"Oh." Sacha eyed me critically as he stepped into the tiny room. He'd showered since the last time I'd seen him, dressed in jeans and a white V-neck. He dropped his long body onto my bed, propping himself up with his elbows. "What are we doing today?"

Closing the door, I turned to look at him while attempting to ease the thunder going on in my heart. "I was planning on staying in."

"I thought you wanted to walk around?" He raised a dark eyebrow.

Another shrug. "Maybe tomorrow, I'm tired. I'm sure someone else can go out with you."

Sacha just blinked at me. “I want to go with you.”

No, no, no, no, no
. I smiled at him. “I’m sure you’ll have just as much fun with someone else.”

He stared at me for so long in silence I wasn’t sure he was ever going to respond until he finally did. His question cool and controlled. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing."

"Gaby."

I gave him the weakest smile in existence. "I'm just pooped and groggy, and my head really hurts."

He blinked again. "When did it start hurting?”

My shoulders went up. “Earlier, before the first flight.”
Right after I heard you tell another woman you cared about her.

He grumbled rolling up to sit on his bottom. He rubbed his hands up and down his pant legs. The look on his face was enough of a warning. “Tell me what's wrong. You're being weird."

"I'm fine," I pleaded. "I just want to be alone right now."

Those pale eyes twitched in disbelief and possibly hurt. "Don't do this to me again."

"What?" I asked him even though I already knew what he was trying to hint at.

"You're pushing me away. I don’t like it."

"Sacha, I'm not—" Damn it.

He grimaced. "See, you never call me Sacha." He pushed off the edge of the bed to stand. "Tell me what's wrong."

I shook my head and averted my eyes to the ceiling. Sure I’d teared up for a split second, but I'd swiped at them and that was it. "It's nothing," I muttered.

"You're lying," he replied.

I was, and I hated it. I wasn't a liar. Maybe sometimes I left things out by omission, but I didn't enjoy doing it. I was terrible at it. But what would I tell him? The truth?
Hey Sassy, I realized I was in love with you last night, and then you told your ex that you care about her but that there isn't anyone else in the picture
. Right. That sounded like the worst idea ever.

When he gripped my wrist with his warm fingers, I sucked in a breath. "Gaby baby."

Eli had told me once a very long time ago that you weren't living unless you took risks. The thing he never mentioned was that risks were scary. I didn't deal with rejection well. But what was four more weeks? It'd be easier for me to ignore him for that time than it would be for me to lie and pretend that I was fine when I wasn't.

"Tell me, Princess," he said with a squeeze to my wrist.

I'd never really considered myself very brave before. Usually I found my strength from my brother, who didn’t care enough what people thought to worry about consequences, or Laila, who wasn’t fazed of most things. My trust in others was usually the reassurance I needed to do things that made me nervous. I knew that they would never do anything to kill me.

All I had was four more weeks left.

I sighed and looked everywhere except at him. "I looked into something more than I should have and now I just feel stupid. That's all."

"What was it?" he asked in a voice barely above a whisper.

Balls. I had invisible balls and I could do this. "I thought that someone liked me, but I realized that maybe it wasn't the same kind of attraction that I was hoping for," I told him slowly, meeting his eyes in the greatest act of bravery I'd ever accomplished singlehandedly.

His beautiful face swept into a clouded, dark expression. "Who?" His question was asked slowly.

Jesus F. Christ. I swallowed hard. "Who what?"

"Who doesn't like you?"

Oh brother. "You're a nice guy, Sassy. I know that. Everyone knows that. Hell, I think Eli has a crush on you.” I smiled at him just a little, reminding myself that it wasn’t his fault he was so likable. “It's not in your nature to be a complete dick, and that's okay. I get it. I like that about you a lot, but you don't have to pretend. At least don't pretend with me."

Sacha's eyebrows furrowed before he scowled at me, confusion marring the planes of his features. "What are you talking about?"

"Oh my God," I moaned and went to take a step back but he held my wrist tight.

Men. Idiot, idiot men.

I must have stared at him long and hard enough that it finally hit him. His hand went up to that favorite part of his skull he was always rubbing, and he scoffed in disbelief at the same time. "You think I don't like you?"

And I wanted to die. "I think you like me in a different way than I like you, if you insist on knowing."
Kill me. Kill me now.

"What?" he hissed, taking a step forward. "Why would you think that?"

My eyes went to the ceiling again. I didn't want to have this conversation. Every fiber of my being was revolting against me. "Everyone in the van heard your phone conversation, Sassy.
No one special. You care about your ex-girlfriend but you don't want to get back together with her.
" I tugged my arm back uselessly. "I get it. It's fine."

But it wasn't.

Sacha let out a long breath. "You heard what I told Liz, and you think that what I said changes anything?" He took another step toward me. "You really think that I don't like you?"

When I didn't say anything in response, he tapped at the corner of his mouth with the tip of his tongue. "Gaby, I can tell you that I hate you. I can tell you that I think you're the worst person I've ever met. The ugliest girl on the planet. I can tell everyone in the audience tomorrow that I'm gay, but do you think that changes a single thing?

“You make me happier than anyone else ever has, and if you knew how many people I’ve met, you’d understand what that means. I know you don't know Liz, but that was the only way I knew I could get to her. If I'd told her that I thought you were the best thing on the planet, it would've made her relentless. She doesn't know what ‘no’ means. And it's no one's business but mine how I feel about you," he said quickly.

As much as his words warmed me, they weren't what I wanted. They weren't a fleck of a confirmation. They were an explanation that made complete sense to me, but that didn't ease my worry enough. "I get it. I think you’re great too," I told him with a sigh. "But that's not—"

"Is the sun the biggest object in space?" he asked me in an even, determined voice.

I had to think about that one for all of a split second before I shook my head, confused at what he was asking. "No."

"How do you explain to the sun that there are stars far away that dwarf it?" He lowered his face to mine. "I’ve liked you from the moment I met you.” He blinked, his eyebrows knitting together in surprise. “Damn, Gaby. I’m fucking crazy about you.”

Say what?

His eyes bore right into mine, drinking in the confusion that I’m sure was apparent in them. “Don’t look at me like that.”

“You’re—you—” I—what—

His fingers pinched my earlobes. “You haven’t been single for long. I didn’t want to rush you into anything, and I wasn’t about to let you out of my life even after the tour ends,” he explained in a low, even cadence. His voice was hypnotic and I was hooked. A small, frustrated smile covered his mouth. “You're an idiot if you think that you're no one special to me. You're the most special." His lips hovered over mine. "The most."

Dead. I was dead and this was the afterlife.

He slowly pulled me forward. His hand cupped my cheek; his soft lips were filled with purpose when they covered mine so tenderly I couldn't think to breathe. Sacha's mouth opened slowly, coaxing mine to do the same. Just as gradually, he angled his lips to kiss me as deeply as possible. He tasted faintly like mint.

Two hands cradled my face suddenly as he held us in one piece, like he was worried I'd try to pull away. He moaned deep in his throat when I kissed him back with the same intensity he kissed me. One of his palms drifted to the back of my neck, gripping it strongly while his other arm wrapped around my waist and brought my lower body flush against his. Every lean muscle of his upper body pressed against mine, bunching and flexing with the force of his actions.

Then he pulled away a fraction of an inch to give my cheek a wet, open-mouth kiss. "Do you need me to spell it out for you?"

I shivered and nodded, tilting my head more openly toward him. "I think so."

"
Y
ou hurt my feelings
," I told Sacha in a low voice after those awesomely wonderful first kisses.

I'd briefly thought about not telling him how much his words had bothered me, but I decided against it. I'd already jumped in with both feet by admitting that I liked him, and that it was him that made me feel stupid. At this point my dignity was around the block and it wasn’t going to return anytime soon.

"Gaby," he sighed, reaching forward to wrap his long fingers around my wrist. Tugging me toward him, he patted the open space between his extended legs. It didn't take a genius to understand that he wanted me to sit between them, but I couldn’t. At least not yet. Instead I sat a couple of inches away from his closest thigh. "That's the last thing I'd want to do."

I nodded. Something deep in my gut told me he was speaking the truth. "It's okay."

Turning his entire body toward me, one foot on the floor, his other leg bent and resting on the mattress, his hands landed on my shoulders and slowly inched their way down my arms. His smooth palms curved over my biceps and elbows. "It's not okay. I should have settled things when I saw her," Sacha replied. He leaned forward, wrapping his arms around me in a loose, comforting hug as one of his kneecaps pressed against mine. "I’ve been nuts about you. I guess I just assumed you knew.”

“Oh.” Knew? How? Okay, maybe the signs had been there but I hadn’t let myself get too attached to them.

"Gaby," he whispered, bringing one hand up to drape the end of my ponytail over my shoulder. "I don't know what I'm doing with you half the time." Sacha snickered almost lazily. "I like you so much it makes me stupid."

I couldn't help but snort, pulling back and glancing up at him. "I think you were already in that boat long before I came along, Sassy."

He chuckled softly, leaning forward a moment later to kiss my cheek. It might have made me snuck in a surprised breath. "See? Not liking you is like fighting gravity.”

This fucking guy was going to be the death of me.

"Lots of people don't like me, like Miles," I scoffed. "Everyone else just puts up with me because of Eli, probably."

Lips planted themselves high on my cheek twice and each time I had to battle the urge to crawl into his lap and ask for more. "You don't see things clearly." His nose made the trip down until he was nuzzling my throat. "You're special to a lot of people, but especially to me."

I looked at him, seeing those smoke-colored eyes much closer than I was used to. I wasn't fishing for compliments, or reassurance in the love that people like my brother and Mason had for me. I knew that they cared. Their love was easy and unconditional.

Whether this thing between us was just a whole lot of “like” or love—that I wasn't sure about. I'd grown up sharing things my entire life. There had never been a “mine” option with my siblings, everything belonged to the community, but with Sacha… there wasn't that option. There could never be that option.

"It's over, though?" I asked him, looking down at the bed. "Between you and Ron—I mean, Liz?"

Another slow kiss landed on my throat as he kept eye contact with me through his lashes, lingering the heat of a thousand fires. "I swear."

"I can smell your bullshit a mile away," I warned him, trying my best to focus on what I was saying and not how he was making me feel with all those kisses.

Sacha laughed low. "Oh, I know, Princess. I don't expect any less, but I promise. There’s nothing there and there hasn’t been for a long time. Even when there was, it was nothing close to this." He touched my ear. “You know you can trust me.”

The hell of it was, I knew I could.

“We’re fine then?” he asked with hesitation stamping his tone. “Better than before?”

I nodded and blinked at him, needing and wanting to make sure that we were on the same page. “Just to make sure… you have feelings for me too, right?”

Those light colored eyes rolled before he pressed his forehead against mine, his nose touching my own. I could sense his breath on my mouth as he whispered, “So many feelings you have no idea.”

Well, shit. What came out of my mouth was probably the dumbest, most understated reply that I could have possibly come up with: “Okay.”

“Okay?” he asked. I could feel his grin, though I couldn’t see it from how close we were.

“Yes. Okay.” I felt like I could breath for the first time in hours or longer. Did that mean I knew what was going on? No. I guess I’d missed the guidelines on when people were officially dating and when they weren’t since my past experiences were nothing to compare against. Brandon had simply called me his girlfriend one day when introducing me to people and that had been that. My boyfriend in high school had
asked
me to be his girlfriend. How the hell were you supposed to know?

A loud knock on my door snapped us out of our bubble. I groaned and jumped up to check the peephole. My brother stood on the other side with his arms crossed over his chest before I let him in.

"We're going on one of those double-decker tours. Put some shoes on," he said quickly, before narrowing his eyes. “And some make-up. Definitely put some make-up on.”

Asshole.

I stood there with my mouth open a second, which made him frown and then peek over my shoulder to spot Sacha sitting on my bed. A slow grimace covered Eliza's face before he shuddered.

"Oh fuck, I'm going to be sick," he groaned before gagging.

I laughed and socked him in the stomach. "Shut up. We're fully clothed, you idiot."

Eli smiled quickly and winked at Sacha, only confirming the man-crush I felt he had on him. "Come on, Sach. You can translate what those tour guides are saying."

"They're speaking English," I told my brother, feeling one of my eyes begin to twitch.

"But they have accents, Flabby, hello."

I looked over my shoulder to find Sacha shaking his head, so I snickered. "Luckily for you, E, Sacha speaks stupid, so he can translate."

"
A
nd you wonder
why you don't have any friends."

Sacha shot me a look as he raked both hands through his hair. He'd just finished telling me that I was out of my fucking mind for wanting to get on the ride. Those pale eyes peered up again, taking in the Ferris wheel-type thing that was currently scaring the shit out of him. He blinked and swallowed hard. "I can't do it," he stated.

"You're really that scared?" I asked, crossing my arms over my chest.

Eli and Gordo were standing close by, my brother busy gesturing and leering at a group of women to our right. Knowing him, he was planning on which girl he would hit on first. The poor, poor soul. Thankfully, no one was witnessing the freak-out that I thought Sacha was about to have. He glanced at me again before looking at the London Eye warily.

"You're scared of heights?"

Sacha swallowed. "I can handle normal heights; getting on a ladder or on a counter, but
that
is too tall. Way too tall," he let out in one breath, watching the huge contraption.

I turned around to look at the looming attraction. It was pretty damn tall. Even though I wasn't scared of heights, it was intimidating. Eliza had been the one to suggest that we get on after our double-decker tour bus adventure. I was more than glad that we'd gotten through it without my brother insulting someone with the dumb shit that came out of his mouth. Gordo had been the one who got stuck sitting next to him, while Sacha and I crowded together on a seat. Now that I thought about it, it was me that had hung off the edge of the bus taking in the sights while he sat up straight and took everything in that I know he’d seen before.

It wasn't his first time visiting London, and it wasn't my brother's either, but I liked that they both went out of their ways to do things that they knew I hadn't done. Things that they wouldn't have done if I hadn’t been around. I couldn't imagine Eli or Gordo riding along on a tourist bus for fun. Hell, I was surprised Eliza wasn't hitting up a pub instead, but I wasn't about to bring it up.

"If you really don't want to get on, we don't have to," I told him, smiling just a little at his fear.

He groaned and looked up at the contraption behind me again, teeth grinding. "But you already got our tickets—"

"Oh lord, Sassy, I'd rather stay down here with you than have you flipping out up there," I poked him in his stomach, enjoying how normal everything felt after the conversation we’d had in my hotel room. "It's fine. Don't worry about it. I'm scared of the dark, so don't judge me."

He raised an eyebrow at me, giving me the tiniest hint of a smile. "The dark?"

"Yep," I told him. "I have a nightlight in my room."

He laughed, taking a step forward. "For some reason, I'm not surprised." His hands reached up to land on my shoulders, squeezing them lightly and I let the flutters of attraction fly through my belly. "You know there's nothing to be scared of, right?"

I shrugged and looked behind me. "Have you seen scary movies? There's plenty of stuff to be scared of. Freddy Krueger, Michael Myers,
Chucky
. I didn’t want to shower alone for about a month after I watched
It.
No thanks."

Sacha smiled that big grin that made my chest flutter. This was all new and sudden, but at the same time, not really. This had been coming, hadn’t it? Even Eli wasn’t teasing me or making faces. That had to be a sign. This—him—was easy. Effortless. It just felt right.

It probably should have been strange that less than a few hours ago, I didn't even want to speak to him, but it wasn't. He liked me. I liked him. And Ronalda was out of my Happy Meal.

What more could I want, besides a naked Sacha?

"If they come after you, I'm there," he chuckled.

I laughed, thinking of how my baboons would leave me to die if it came down to it. "Unless we have to climb up the side of a building."

"In that case, it was nice knowing you,” he snickered.

Oh dear God. I loved it. I really loved it.

"Disgusting and Gross, ready to go?" Eli asked.

Taking a step back, I turned my head to see my brother and Gordo standing there, smirking. I rolled my eyes. "I don't think we're getting on."

He gave me an incredulous look. We'd been riding roller coasters together from before I was even tall enough to ride, so he knew there was a legitimate reason I wasn't getting on. "Why the hell not?"

Sacha made a noise in his throat, and I knew he was getting ready to say something. But I didn't want to do that to him. To tell Eli Barreto you had a weakness was the equivalent of bleeding within a mile of a shark.

"I need to go number two," I blurted out before thinking and immediately cringed. Of all the things I could have said…

Sacha snorted.

My twin nodded without batting an eyelash. "Got it." Of course he would. If there was anything in the world he took seriously, it was taking a shit.

A few minutes later, he and Gordo trotted off toward the entrance to the Eye. Sacha groaned for a minute before leading me after them. "Come on. If I pass out, at least break my fall."

My chest tightened again at his small act of braveness. For me. Because he knew I wanted to get on. "I swear I won’t tell anyone if you faint."

"You're too kind," he smirked with wide eyes, looking up at the attraction again.

As soon as Eli spotted us in line, he threw his arms out to the sides and asked in a voice that was way too loud, "I thought you needed to take a shit?"