Under His Skin (13 page)

“Will you shut up already?” She glared up at him. “You’re such a guy.”

“You said that already. I have no idea what it means.” He needed to fix this. “Please stop crying.”

She huffed and wrapped her arms around his waist. “Hold me.”

“I can do that.” Squeezing her to his chest, he tucked her head under his chin and exhaled slowly, ignoring the burning sensation from his side. Not knowing if the crisis was averted, he held his proverbial breath for another few moments. Finally, Pandora’s hold on him loosened and she straightened.

“Thanks,” she mumbled and looked at his throat.

“Can we talk about this?” he asked slowly. He held the roses up. “I brought you flowers.”

She took the bundle he thrust into her grasp and wiped at her eyes again. Makeup smeared around the edges of her eyes. A fresh sheen of tears glistened on her cheeks.

He grabbed the roses and tried to pull them from her grasp. “Wait, no, I’m sorry, no flowers.”

Turning away from him, she shielded the roses from his grasp and gave out a watery laugh. “Stop,” she said through the tears and laughter. “No one’s ever bought me flowers before.”

He had to stop and replay her words. No one had ever given her flowers? Not her parents or a boyfriend, even for prom? The roses weren’t even that special, just a bundle wrapped in plastic with a few of the tiny white flowers to liven them up a little. He’d bought them at a grocery store on his way over to the shop. He hadn’t wanted to come to her empty-handed, and roses were classic.

Grabbing her around her waist, he walked them backward until he bumped the passenger side seat of the Jeep and leaned against it. Pandora snuggled against his chest, her back to his front, and kept her weight to his non-freshly tattooed side. They had to get better about their timing. He wanted to hurry up and heal enough so he could feel her hands on him, her fingers tracing his tattoos.

“It’s getting late,” she mumbled.

“Yeah, so? We were talking on the phone this time last night.”

She glared up at him. “Exactly my point.”

Flattening his palm over her stomach, he pulled her against him again. “Why don’t you spend the night at my place? It’ll be more comfortable than falling asleep with the phone burning my face off.”

She didn’t reply at once. He still didn’t know what had upset her. Maybe she was getting close to her time of the month or something. He was praying she was telling the truth and it wasn’t his fault. He wouldn’t be able to forgive himself if he’d hurt her. He still felt some responsibility for his former band mates and what had happened to her. If he’d been more aware, if he’d paid attention, maybe things would have turned out differently.

“What does this make us then?” Her voice sounded deceptively light compared to the way her shoulders tensed.

Confused, he leaned to the side to catch a glimpse of her face. “What do you mean, what does this make us?”

“I’m asking so I know.” She hugged the flowers to her chest and tipped her head back.

Was she seeing someone else and feeling guilty about boning him in the bathroom? Or was she protecting herself from him? Either way he looked at it, it pissed him off that she even needed to ask him. “If you want to put a label on it, we’re dating.”

The muscles under his hands jumped. “Is that what you’re calling it?”

“God, Pandy, what do you want me to say? Yes.” He gritted his teeth to keep from saying something else that might get him in trouble.

“Don’t say that just because of the sex.”

Stunned, he didn’t know how to reply to that.

Pushing away from him, she stepped back a few paces.

“Stop picking a fight with me.” He straightened, ignoring the tightness in his hip, and looked down at her.

“Not so perfect now, am I?” Her brows lifted and her fist perched on her waist.

He threw his hands out in frustration. “You’re a perfect pain in my ass right now. Come back to my place. We can argue, have angry sex, fight some more and wrap it up with make-up sex. I’ll even get donuts in the morning.”

After a pause big enough to drive a Mack truck through, the defiant tilt of her jaw eased. “I don’t know where you live.”

He wanted to sigh in relief but kept that to himself. “I could drive you.”

She shook her head. “I work tomorrow.”

He spread his hands. “So do I.”

“It’ll be easier if I have my car.” She jerked her head to the beat-up Honda a few spots over from his Jeep.

“Follow me.”

Nodding, she turned and headed to her car.

“Hey, Pandy,” he called when she was halfway there.

Pausing, she glanced over her shoulder.

“You’d better change your Facebook status.” Brian hooked his thumbs in his pockets. “No one hits on my girlfriend.”

Grinning, he slammed the door shut and circled around to the driver’s side. Something yellow crammed under his windshield wiper caught his attention. Pulling it out, he shoved it in his pocket to throw in the trash later.

* * * * *

Pandora’s stomach churned and her foot eased up on the gas. Ahead of her, Brian’s Jeep got farther away. She wanted to rewind to sex in the bathroom and tell him that they’d had a great night but she was going home. If she could erase the uncomfortable conversation in the parking lot and her decision to follow him home, she would. Right now they were rating up there with falling for Robert as things she regretted.

Neat blue condos rose up on either side of the street. Brian had keyed in a code to get them through the gates, so she seriously doubted this was a shortcut. It wasn’t the condos but the area of town. It was nice. The kind of nice she was exposed to maybe once a year during the holidays when she got drunk with the girls and they packed into a car and went driving around looking for Christmas lights. It was the kind of place that frowned on girls with lots of tattoos and beat-up old cars.

The Jeep pulled into a two-car garage at the end of the street. She tapped her foot to Flogging Molly’s
Black Friday Rule
, but didn’t feel any of the passion behind the lyrics. She didn’t park in the driveway. It would take too long to back out if she decided to bolt. Instead, she left her car at the curb. Compared to the BMWs and Lexuses, her red Honda stuck out like a sore thumb.

Brian twirled his keys around his finger and waited for her in the glow of a floodlight. She could leave now. Say she’d forgotten about something and couldn’t stay, but he would know she was lying. They’d spent too long getting to know each other, and her deception would be obvious. She’d shot herself in the foot by indulging her desire to see to him.

“Nice place,” she said to fill the silence. She could hear the distant hum of cars driving by on the main road through the neighborhood, the soft sound of cicadas and crickets. It was a humid spring night. Before much longer, the heat would have them all trapped indoors.

He gestured for her to precede him through the garage. “Thanks. It still feels like I just moved in. It’s a little weird living alone, but I wasn’t going to stay with my parents any longer than I had to.” He pressed his hand to the small of her back, guided her to a door and unlocked it. “Do you mind dogs?”

“You have a dog? How all-American.” Stepping into the kitchen, she glanced around but couldn’t make out more than vague lumps of furniture. Anxious to be gone, she reached up and twirled the Monroe in place.

“He was Ike’s. I share him with Ike’s sister now, but most of the time he’s here.” Brian flipped on the lights, moved past her to a sliding patio door and opened it. “Hey, Gibson, here boy.”

A sausage log on legs trotted into the kitchen and flopped down at his feet.

“What is that?”

Gibson didn’t look like any dog she’d ever seen.

“He’s a Corgi.” Brian knelt and ran his hands over the dog’s golden coat. Instead of jumping around, excited to see his owner, Gibson stretched out on the tiles and whined.

Dogs scared her most of the time. She hadn’t been allowed to have one as a child, and rarely interacted with them. Edging closer, she watched Gibson for any sign that he was about to attack her, but he merely turned his dark eyes to her and whined again. He didn’t seem like a mean kind of dog, but then again he was about the size of a large handbag, not exactly a terrifying creature. He looked rather pitiful.

Crouching next to Brian, she gripped her knees, torn between wanting to touch the dog and not knowing how.

“Can I pet him?”

Brian sat down, pulling Gibson over one leg, and tilted his head to the side, as if he didn’t understand the question. “Yeah, go ahead.”

Hesitantly, she ran her hand over the dog’s fur. Surprised by how soft his coat was, she pushed her fingers through his thick mane and Gibson lay there, permitting her to touch him.

“On our first tour, we were at some burger place and Ike needed to take a leak but their bathroom was stopped up. So he went around back. He found Gibson in a dumpster. He was a tiny puppy then. We got a box and took turns mashing up food for him to eat. We didn’t sleep at all because he wouldn’t stop crying. He went on almost all of our tours with us after that.”

Glancing up, she tried to read between the lines, but couldn’t remember anything about a dog. “Was he with you when…?”

“No.” He cupped Gibson’s head. “Since we were flying out for a few days, it wasn’t worth the hassle. He still thinks Ike’s coming back, and I don’t know how to tell him he’s not.”

She didn’t know what to say. She’d never thought that a dog could be depressed, but it made sense.

“Do you want the tour?”

“Um, sure.” Anything to change the topic.

As they got to their feet, he took her hand and beckoned the dog to follow. “Kitchen, which I’ve barely used, unless the microwave and fridge count. And over here is the living room. Looks more like storage, I know.”

He flipped on more lights, illuminating a couch buried behind black cargo boxes. A flat screen TV mounted on the wall was the only functional piece of furniture in the space that should have accommodated a large den and dining nook. Her heart thudded painfully in her chest. She could hazard a guess what was in the boxes. Instruments that didn’t belong to him, equipment he hadn’t been able to part with after the crash. It was a tomb. Sucker Punch Sunday was buried in his house, and he lived with the memories all around him. How was he supposed to move on from that?

Tugging on her arm, he led her to the stairs that climbed over the kitchen and disappeared. “I spend most of my time up here.”

The stairs marked a clear change between the life he used to have and the life he lived now. Along the stairs were t-shirts, a dog toy, signs that he lived here.

He pushed the first door on the left open and flipped on the light. Cardboard boxes filled most of it. “Um, more storage. It’s merch for the tour we were supposed to have the next year. I keep meaning to do something with all of this.”

She stepped into the room, shocked that the boxes filled the space from floor to ceiling. “All of this is t-shirts and stuff?”

“No, not all of it. I think my guitars and stuff are against the wall.” He gestured at the far wall.

“Do you still play?”

He was quiet for a moment. “No. Music was something I did for a while. It’s not who I am. That part of me is gone. Anyways.” He closed the door, leaving the light on, and gestured for her to precede him.

The hallway was lined with posters, a few pictures and the platinum albums the band earned. And in the middle of all of it, a piece of artwork in a hand she knew too well.

She stopped and stared, not sure what to think.

“Oh, um. You’re probably wondering about that.” Brian leaned against the wall and focused on the picture.

“I drew that.”

Unlike the flower she’d given to him in jest, never knowing it would be something he cherished, she hadn’t given him this. At the time, Robert had said she wasn’t ready for anything other than drawing flowers. She’d squirreled away some tracer paper and sketched the traditional gypsy portrait when no one was looking. It was just a pencil drawing, with some light shading done in blue, green and red. She could pick out the flaws, but at the time she had been proud of it. Her sense of color and shading were spot-on. The subtle hues around the eyes and mouth gave it a softer, more feminine style. When she hadn’t been able to find it, she’d assumed Robert had trashed the sketch.

Now, the edges were worn and a stain marred one corner, but protected by the glass and hung in a stylish if battered brass frame, it looked like an antique piece.

“Yeah, I took it.”

She didn’t know what to say to that, so she said nothing at all. After an awkward moment, he gestured to an adjacent door.

“This is my office.” He flipped the lights on in what might have been a spare bedroom in another house. Two walls had desks, papers, rulers and bits of equipment she didn’t recognize. It appeared as if he actually worked out of this room.

“Do you work?” she asked slowly. She hadn’t given a thought to what Brian would do now that the band was gone. It was confusing and jarring to think of him without a bass.

He shoved his hands into his pockets and leaned up against the door. “Uh, yeah. I got a degree a few years ago between tours and things.”

“But I thought you worked for your uncle? Construction.” She took him in, his plain t-shirt and jeans. With his hair cropped short, he looked like an average guy. He could fit in, have a typical all-American life. The kind of life that she didn’t belong in.

“Yeah, I work for my uncle.” He didn’t meet her gaze. “It’s part-time right now, until he thinks I’m up to it. When I’m done with my probationary period, I’ll be an engineer for his construction company. I’m really rusty, don’t have a lot of experience, but I learn a lot and I can do some of the work at home.”

“Wow. That’s good, isn’t it?”

Sweat broke out along her spine. She couldn’t do this. Brian had too much going for him, he needed a Suzie Homemaker that would complete the picture, host barbeques and play fetch with Gibson. Someone who could focus on him and had their shit together.