The Duet(82)

“Yes, I am,” he answered simply.

“Why?”

He dropped my arm and fell back against the wall across from me. The added space helped clear my head.

“I know LuAnne called and told you the full story about my past,” he said.

I frowned. “Are you mad?”

He shook his head. “I’m relieved you know everything now.”

“Is that why you came here?”

He dragged his teeth along his bottom lip, forming a reply. “I realized that your lyrics were true— the part about us being over from the start. And that’s my fault.”

I grunted in disbelief. “Go on.”

He rolled his eyes at my sass but I couldn’t help it. “I didn’t want to be your friend. I didn’t want to collaborate with you, but I didn’t have a choice.”

“Wow. How romantic,” I said.

He groaned and dragged his hands through his hair again. I was going to cause him to bald prematurely from all of the stress.

“No, just listen. I didn’t need a woman in my life. I was still trying to sort out my past. But if I’d pulled my head out of my ass for a minute, I would have seen the truth.”

I folded my hands behind my back and met his gaze. “What’s the truth?”

“We should have been friends from the start. Real friends.”

His earnest expression, and the fear of rejection in his dark eyes, softened my resolve.

“You’re really just here to make sure that Cammie doesn’t send you any more poisoned fruit,” I said, smirking.

He smirked back. “True. That’s mostly the reason.”

We were stitching together a bridge, attempting to repair a relationship that was nonexistent to begin with.

I stuck my hand out between us. His dark gaze fell, studying my proverbial white flag for a moment before he peered back up at me. His features were relaxed then, his grin the most beguiling part of his appearance. When he took my hand, his finger struck my pulse point and I inhaled a sharp breath.

“I’m sorry about running and I’m sorry about misjudging the situation.”

He nodded, with a small smirk.

“Friends?” I asked, trying to control the excitement in my voice.

Oh, c’mon, who was I kidding with the “friends” bullshit? I wanted to open the suite door to our left and push him inside so I could have my wicked way with him. But that’s what the old Brooklyn would have done. The new Brooklyn, who was cool, calm, collected, and didn’t need carbs or caffeine (and apparently only used words that started with a “c”) could just shake his hand and pretend to be unaffected.

“Friends,” he agreed before dropping my hand.

“Just to clear it up, do friends have sex?”

He laughed, “No. I don’t think they do.”

Damn.

“What about just oral? Like a ‘how ya doin’ blow job? That’s okay, right?”

He laughed and shook his head, pushing me toward our suite with his hand on my lower back.

“Do you do that sort of thing for Grayson?” he asked, watching me out of the corner of his eye.

I laughed. “Oh, nice, I would have brought Grayson around earlier if I knew he’d make you jealous.”

He shook his head a little too adamantly. “Nah, friends don’t get jealous of friends.”

I patted his chest just as we got back to the suite. “Keep thinking that, buddy,” I teased. Before I could pull my hand away, he caught it in his and pressed it harder to his chest so that I could feel the rhythm of his heart beneath my palm. Okayyyy then, this… this was seriously not something I could do with someone who was just a friend.

“After you, buddy,” he drawled with way too much seduction. Was buddy a euphemism for something? It definitely sounded like it.

Before I could delve deeper into that question, Hank pulled the suite door open for us and Jason released my hand.

…



“You did it!” I yelled as soon as Cammie slid into the limousine. We’d all been sitting inside, waiting for her to join us so we could make our reservation for lunch. I’d extended an invitation to both Jason and Grayson (hah, that has a nice ring to it), but Grayson insisted that he wanted to drive separately and meet us at the restaurant. I swear the man was more hormonal than a pregnant woman in her first trimester.

Cammie held her arms up and cheered as she scooted along the black leather. “No more studio. No more impossible projects and no more annoying professors!” she sang. Then she glanced to the end of the limousine where Jason was sitting, and her smile fell.

“Damn. Looks like my fruit basket didn’t work. You’re supposed to be dead,” she said, glaring at him. “I guess you didn’t try the grapefruit.”