Jesus.
I swear to God it had to be the music or something because this complete one eighty has my head spinning.
Oh well.
Lucky looks up at me with slightly widened eyes as I pull both of them a little closer, a fake scowl on my face as I shift between them. “Leo, baby cakes, I can explain.”
“We both can,” Pete quickly adds.
“We can explain everything.”
God, they’re cute when they’re nervous.
I don’t want to make them uncomfortable, just a tad anxious, they deserve it a little after keeping something clearly important from me, but I don’t want to drag this out either because the longer I sit here looking at these two beautiful, sweaty, sexy as hell men, the less I care about an explanation.
Lucky and Pete? They make sense together. I obviously missed something during my time in mypitbut the two of them make a hell of a lot of sense actually, and it validates the thoughts I’ve been having since we started playing four hours ago.
It just sucks that it took me so long to see it.
Better late than never, I guess.
Which is why I lift my hands and place one on each of their cheeks, smiling when theybothend up looking surprised.
My eyes bounce around their faces, taking in every inch of each, my heart rate speeding up as my truth begins to sink in.
Fuck it.
That do or die attitude I’ve been trying to have just leveled up, and I’m not going to let it go to waste.
So, I take a deep breath, smooth my thumbs across each of their bottom lips then say, “It doesn’t matter, I want both of you.”
14
LUCKY
Leo drops her hand from my face and fists the front of my shirt, repeating the words I was hoping like hell I’d hear from her one day.
Telling me she’s in love with me is one thing, but Leo saying that she accepts and wants meandPete, it’s something else entirely. She doesn’t have to be in love with him, not yet, Pete and I talked about how it could take Leo time and he’s ok with it, but the instant acceptance of our relationship? And wanting to be with both of us because of it? It’s not at all unexpected even if the quickness of it is surprising.
But after disassociating from her entire life for a long ass time, I’m still not totally convinced Leo is ready for all of this.
I mean, I trust Leo, trust that she knows what she wants but we’re all still riding the high from playing together for the first time in years. And we know how she gets after a show. Hell, the thrill of playing gets everyone hornier than shit, and it’s always been a point of contention for me and Leo. Which makes perfect sense now.
After shows, we tried to go out and party together instead of finding the nearest warm body, tried to avoid the fights thatwould happen if either one of us took a groupie back to the dressing room or tour bus. We tried to be a little more civil and have a little more tact than that at least, out of respect for everyone because Leo and I would start a knock down drag out fight regardless of which one of us was about to do the banging, and the boys hated that we would kill the post-show vibes by being raging lunatics.
I might be super laid back and rational ninety seven percent of the time but that remaining three percent is reserved for my band, myfamily, and one of the ways to activate it is blind jealousy.
I knew it was because we were using a surrogate, literally using someone else to sub for who we really wanted—I know it was for me anyway—and since I couldn’t have Leo, I tried like hell to take my mind off of how badly I wanted her.
Most of the time I could achieve that when we’d go to a bar or party after a gig and just get blasted. Then Leo and I would flirt like crazy, which kept any interested parties away from both of us, and we’d do everything but make out before she eventually got too sloppy and I’d take her home or to the hotel or whatever to crash.
Then once she was out, I’d jerk off like a madman before I got into bed with her to be her big spoon all night, or sometimes I’d be too drunk and just pass out in a heap on the bed next to her. Totally depended on how much we put down.
But on nights where our shows were exceptionally amazing and partying wasn’t going to hack it, one of us would look for a little action as an outlet.
It wasn’t as bad when we were actually dating someone, I mean it still sucked watching her be with other people but if it was a relationship it was just sort of like accepting defeat. Watching Leo flirt her way around the chicks and dudes whoalways fell at her feet until she found whoever she was feeling, well that was really shitty.
Because if it was just a one time thing, why couldn’t it have been me? That’s what I always thought anyway, but deep down I knew why. If Leo and I crossed that line, even casually, it could have thrown off everything we spent a decade working toward. So she would hook up with some groupie, I’d get pissed, we’d fight, she’d quit the band—I can’t even tell you how many times she made that empty threat—and I’d go find my own piece of ass to forget how much I loved Leo.
