"I'll take that as a no." He turned and started back to the hot tub.
She caught his well-muscled arm and scarcely stifled an excited gasp. He paused and glanced over his shoulder to melt her into a puddle of Reagan pudding with those maddeningly sexy green eyes of his.
"I … " she shrieked. Shrieked? What in the fuck was wrong with her? Keep it together, Reagan. Keep it together. She cleared her throat. "I didn't come out here to join you in the hot tub. I came to challenge you to a guitar duel." What? No, not that. She'd come out there to console Trey about Sinners. To tell him there was no way Brian would ever leave the band. But what did she know? She didn't know Brian. She was just a hopeful fangirl.
His eyebrows lifted with interest. "A guitar duel?"
"Yeah. I have to go practice with my band." She sucked in a breath of pure terror. She was certainly running through a wide gamut of emotions this morning. "My band … Exodus End," she mumbled. "Oh my fucking God!"
Trey laughed.
Reagan took a deep steadying breath. "After we're done practicing, I want to duel you, Trey Mills."
"At high noon?" He whistled the theme to some old spaghetti Western.
"After you're done with your soak in the hot tub."
"And if I win, you'll join me in the hot tub?"
Her heart skipped several beats. "If that's what you want."
He stroked a lock of hair from her cheek. "That's only the beginning of what I want, Reagan."
She laughed again. She really was just nervous, but she knew it sounded like she was laughing at him. Rejecting his advances. Never in a million years would she purposely laugh at Trey Mills. And yet, she kept doing it. He dropped his hand, a confused scowl on his handsome face. Reagan wanted to strangle herself.
"If I win the duel, we're going to the skate park," she said. The skate park? What am I? Thirteen?
"You skate?"
"Sometimes," she admitted. Oh God, he thinks I'm an immature idiot.
"Sounds fun."
Liar, liar, lack of pants, I'm on fire. "Yeah. Good. See you later, then." Mortified by her complete lack of poise, she fled into the house through the door Trey had left open and followed the sounds of music to the practice room.
"There you are," Dare said. "I was starting to think I was going to have to come rescue you from the hot tub and my brother's libido."
Reagan's cheeks flamed. That might have been a possibility if she hadn't made a complete fool of herself.
"She's not stupid enough to fall for that player," Max said.
Oh, but she was. Stupid. For that player.
With his good hand, Max took Reagan by the wrist and led her into a large closet beside the practice room. They faced a wall that had guitars hanging from one end to the other on pegs. Some were Dare's. Some Max's. Some Logan's bass guitars. All drool-worthy. Reagan sighed in bliss. Who needed men when you had guitars? She wanted to roll around on them naked. Which would probably be a tad uncomfortable, but she didn't care. She was in lust with every instrument in the room.
"Dare pointed out that I won't need my guitars," Max said, "at least for a while, so take your pick."
"I couldn't," Reagan said, even as her fingers itched to grab the black guitar with electric blue flames directly in front of her.
"At least try one out. I'd rather give them to you than get rid of them. Think of it as a gift."
"Okay," she gushed and lifted the guitar from the hooks in the wall.
"Nice choice," he said.
She had the sudden urge to burst into tears. Maximilian Richardson had paid her a compliment. And let her touch his guitar. Even better, let her play his guitar. How was she ever going to get used to this?
Once they had her hooked up to an amplifier, Max called out songs and everyone followed his lead. Reagan was really glad she'd practiced all of their songs to prepare for the audition. She actually knew what she was doing, and they seemed impressed that she was keeping up with them. Sweet!
As she played with her new band, she had to continually remind herself that to really serve them as a musician she should mimic Max's sound as closely as she could. It wasn't much of a challenge. Max was a great guitarist, but Dare was the real six-stringed talent in the band. Reagan played with her usual heart, but damn if it wasn't hard to concentrate in the presence of this many great musicians. These men were her inspiration. They were rock gods. Gods. And they already accepted her into their fold as if she belonged there. They played through about half of their set list. After several songs Reagan began to relax, but she was careful to keep the sound consistent. She spread her feet apart for balance, closed her eyes, and nodded her head in time with Steve's hard and heavy beat that was made cohesive by Logan's low bass. She let Max's incredible voice carry her away. Paid extra close attention to Dare, to complement his hard, edgy sound rather than compete with it. When the song ended, Reagan opened her eyes to find the members of Exodus End staring at her.