“Will do. Happy New Year, pix.” After a minute, he sighed. “You too, Nick.”
Then he was gone.
“So.” Nick flexed his fingers. Like the other guitarist she knew, he seemed unable to keep his hands still. “Where did Gray really go?”
“I don’t know.”
“C’mon, you have to know that I won’t make trouble—”
“How do I know that? Based on your history of, oh, I don’t know, making trouble at every opportunity? Especially when it comes to me and Gray.”
“You’re a unit.” When she only stared at him, he knotted his fingers together. “You and Gray. Can’t have one without the other.”
She didn’t say anything. It didn’t feel very much like that at the moment, but that didn’t change the reality that her allegiance to Gray couldn’t be broken. The past year of mostly suck couldn’t erase all the millions of good memories they shared.
Besides that, she didn’t want to hurt Nick. If even a shred of his feelings toward her remained from their…whatever the hell it had been, she didn’t want to twist the knife. She’d cared about him too, enough to have sex with him. Still cared despite what he’d done—tried to do—to the band with Simon.
“You know our history,” she said, rubbing her gritty eyes. All she wanted right now was to check out from the world for a few hours. Morning and the class field trip would come all too soon.
“I do. I also saw your future tonight.”
“What future?”
“The one where he runs off and leaves you holding the bag, and you’ll make any excuse in the world for him while he violates everything you think he stands for.”
Her head snapped up. “You don’t know him like I do.”
“No. I don’t. I don’t know you all that well either. But I know people. He’s…not in a good place,” he said finally, directing his attention out the window.
“You don’t know him like I do,” she repeated, ignoring how the words echoed in her chest. So they were having a rough patch. That didn’t change who they were together. Gray was the best friend she’d ever have. She trusted him with her life. Her body. Her heart.
He might not have much use for the second two things in that list, but she wasn’t going to demolish their relationship just because he didn’t want her like she wanted him. Too bad, so sad. She’d lived through worse in her life. So much worse.
Besides, his shutting her out stung more than anything else. Even the sex. She might not have watermelons for breasts, but she’d been Gray’s confidant for years. His lying about needing to leave wounded her in a way nothing else could. And now she was sitting alone with Nick.
Déjà vu was a freaking bitch.
“You want to practice that song? ‘Captured’, was it? We can go back to the apartment, run through it together. You can use Simon’s guitar.”
“Is that all you’re willing to let me use? I mean, let’s be clear about what’s going on here. You’re not just being a helpful bandmate. You have an agenda, right?”
He cracked his knuckles and sprawled back in his chair, sending her a disarming smile that would’ve fooled most people. She’d gotten to know him better than most, not because he wanted to share himself with her, but because she’d made a study of him in the quiet moments when he didn’t know he was being observed. Partly to distract herself from Gray, partly to see if she’d been wrong that Nick had some good inside him in spite of how frigging hard he tried to prove that he didn’t.
“That depends on you.”
“Why?” she asked softly, trying to understand. “Why would you want to get involved in my mess again?”
Something shifted in his golden eyes. “You look like you could use a friend tonight.” He shrugged. “Doesn’t have to be any more complicated than that.”
Oh, if only that were true. “What about you? Can you use a friend?”
His mouth crooked into a semblance of a smile. “Damn sure better than having an enemy.”
She smiled and rose. “Let’s get out of here.”
“So I’m guessing that’s a maybe?” He crossed the room to open the door and ushered her out ahead of him.
“That’s an ‘I’m sorry, but it’s not fair to you’.” She sighed. “Said with plenty of regret.”
“Do you see me worrying about what’s fair?”
“One of us has to. I didn’t before and you got caught in the middle.”
His mouth lifted again. “Sometimes the middle’s a pretty hot place to be.”