A Stone in the Sea(87)

A regretful smile tweaked my mouth. “Playing…that’s really where all of us connected. We’d hide out in Ash’s garage for hours, getting high, writing songs, dreaming of making it big and getting the hell out of our neighborhood.”

I realized then I was sharing things with Shea I’d never shared with anyone before. All the guys? They’d been there. Been through it.

Now she was seeing it through my eyes.

“But it got to the point where getting high was no longer enough and over time it got worse and worse. Snorting and shooting anything that was put under our noses, fucking anything that walked, stealing shit to support it all. We had something good—this chemistry between us that made something magical. But we let all the bad take over the good.”

“You do have something good,” she disputed quietly, words loaded with encouragement.

“Yeah, but Mark didn’t get to see it last. I got out and he didn’t. It almost stole my baby brother, too. I’m responsible for all of that.”

Shea blinked furiously, head shaking in denial. “We’re all responsible for our actions, Baz. You. Mark. Austin. None of you can take back any of the choices you’ve made. And Mark…he paid the greatest price. And I’m so sorry you went down that road together. I can’t even begin to imagine the way you suffer over it. But even before I knew any of this…before I understood where it came from…I saw the way you protect your brother and the rest of the guys. That you’d give up anything to take care of them. Maybe I didn’t know that guy, who years ago was running from home, getting involved in everything he shouldn’t, but I know him now. I know you’re a good man, Sebastian. I’ve seen it. Felt it. I know you.”

She choked over bewildered laughter. “I spent so much time trying to figure you out. How rough you were…the things you said…all the reasons you were pushing me away. I tried to match it up to this amazing guy who stood up for everyone around him. The one who for the first time in my life made me feel truly alive.”

She blinked what seemed a thousand times. “Watching you on stage—”

A sharp pain sliced through me. I hated the thought of her seeing me there, like that, through the eye of a lens—through all the pictures that had been snatched of me through the years. My most vile moments. My most vulnerable moments. The brazen lies and the half-truths, not to mention the cruel reality of who I really was.

“It’s incredible, Sebastian.” Eyes askew, she chewed at her lip, before she opened up and showed me a little more of her. “What you said the night when you left? About you never wanting me to look at you the way those girls did who came into the bar? Never, Sebastian. I would never see you as only that. But when you’re on stage? It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. It’s…it’s terrifying and stunning and completely breathtaking.”

My head swam with what all those videos must have looked like to her, this girl who was all sweet and country delving into the chaos of my world, the way our music came out sounding like it was us against the world—hate, hard, and hostility.

And here she was.

Embracing it.

“It scares me,” she admitted, “who you are. What you do. But I understand it’s part of you.”

“Shea,” I almost pleaded, this girl wringing me tight.

This amazing girl.

My girl.

Didn’t think that could ever happen, and I still had no fucking clue how we were going to make this work. Because I was either going back to jail or going back on the road, and neither of those things exactly boded well for the makings of a solid relationship.

Glancing away, she cleared her throat, then settled her gaze back on me. Guilt slid across her features. “I couldn’t stop watching you, Baz. I’m sorry I invaded your privacy like that, but anything and everything I could find on you, I read. I watched countless videos of you onstage. Stalked Sunder’s Facebook page. I’m not proud of it, but it felt like a lifeline. Something tangible to hold onto when I thought I’d never see you again.”

“Trust me…if I’d have had a direct tap into your life, I’d have been watching you, too.”

She swallowed but didn’t look away. Exposed. Refusing to hide anything. “I saw the pictures that were taken at the show last week. Saw the girls flocking all around you.” Her voice cracked on the emotion. “That hurt so bad.”

I blew out a regretful sigh and roughed a hand over the top of my head. “That’s what I tried to warn you about when I left, Shea. That life I live? There’s always going to be those girls throwing themselves at me. Girls who’ll do anything to get at me.”