Gently, fingers grasped and intertwined with mine. With a sad sigh he brought our joined hands to his lips and kissed each finger. “Is it selfish that I want to keep you to myself for another night?”
I leaned my head back against the seat and smiled up at him. “No. Not selfish at all, because I want the same thing. Too bad that we can’t have everything that we want…”
“Fuck that,” he muttered heatedly. “I’ll fix it so that we can have every night together, Layla.”
I frowned. “How are you going to do that?” I asked. “What does that mean?”
He was already shaking his head. “Don’t worry about it.” Leaning in, he kissed me, making me forget anything he had just said. His fingers tangled in my already horribly knotted hair and pulled me closer. I wanted to climb across the console and straddle him, have sex with him right here in the driveway!
He pulled back just enough to press his forehead against mine. “Go, Layla,” he whispered. “Go before I do something crazy like drive back to Beverly Hills.”
“Jesse…”
“Please, go. I’m not strong enough to…” He released me and fell back against his seat, his eyes closed tight. “Good night, baby. I’ll call you in the morning.”
When he didn’t move to open his door, I slowly reached for my own. “Good night, Jesse,” I whispered before slipping from the SUV.
Swallowing hard to keep my tears from spilling out and making me sob, I walked quickly back to the guest house. How crazy was it that I didn’t want to be away from him for even a night? My heart was actually aching, clenching more and more with each step that took me away from him.
No, no, no! No! Last night—when I had told him I loved him—that had just been in the heat of the moment. It wasn’t true. It wasn’t. I couldn’t be in love with him this soon, this deeply!
But my heart was saying that I was a liar…
Muttering curses under my breath, I opened the door to the guesthouse and walked inside. Lucy was watching television in the living room with a plate of Chinese food in front of her. I stopped and dropped a kiss on her dark head. “Hey, baby doll. Where’s Lana?”
“In the shower,” Lucy informed me after swallowing a mouthful of fried rice and shrimp. “We went swimming with Drake earlier, and she was itching.”
I smiled. “So she and Drake made up?”
Lucy nodded, her attention going back to the television and the episode of Sponge Bob that was on. “Yep. We spent the whole afternoon with him. Then he ordered Chinese, which is awesome, but he left when I had to take my bath.”
“Well I’m glad you two had a good time.” I placed another kiss on her sweet smelling head and turned toward the bedroom. “It’s getting late, sweetheart. As soon as Sponge Bob goes off head to bed, okay?”
“Okay,” she called after me.
The shower was still running when I walked into the bathroom. I could hear Lana humming happily over the running water and couldn’t help smiling to myself. “Hey!” I called to her as I sat on the edge of the toilet seat.
The shower curtain was pulled back enough, and Lana’s head peeked around. She gave me a sly grin. “Hello, stranger. Enjoy your date? A date that lasted more than twenty-four freaking hours?”
I was sure that I was glowing with just how much I had enjoyed myself. “It was the most amazing night of my life.” That was as much detail as my seventeen year old sister was getting. “I heard you had some company this afternoon. So you and Drake are okay now?”
“More than okay.” She pulled the shower curtain back but didn’t stop talking as she continued to shower. “He apologized to me, I forgave him, and then we went swimming. After that, he came over here and we watched movies and ordered dinner. I didn’t want him to go back to the main house, but it was getting late and Lucy needed a bath.”
“Sounds like you guys enjoyed yourselves.”
“I enjoy every minute with Drake…no matter what we are doing.” Lana muttered more to herself than to me.
I sighed. “Lana…”
The water turned off and the curtain snapped back. “Stop worrying so much about it, Layla. I’m not stupid. I know that he’s thirteen years older than me. I know that I don’t stand a chance with him. We are just friends. I know. I know. I know!” She jerked a towel off the hanger and wrapped it around herself almost angrily, but when she stepped from the tub and faced me she was smiling, even if it didn’t quiet reach her eyes. “Just. Friends.”
I stood and pulled her into my arms. “Okay.” I kissed her check, pretending like I believed her. Because while it might be true for Drake that they were just friends, I knew my sister, and what she was feeling was far stronger than mere friendship. I could see the truth in her eyes.
Lana was in love with Drake.
Jesse
I wanted to talk to Emmie as soon as I got home. I had things that I needed her to handle for me. But Nik said that she was asleep, and I didn’t want to bother her if she was comfortable. She had been having insomnia lately, and if she was finally getting some sleep, I wasn’t about to interrupt that.
So I put all the things I needed to do to the back of my mind for now and dropped down on the sectional with my band brothers. It was just the four of us doing nothing more than watching football and drinking beer. It felt good to relax with them.
Half time came and Shane got up to get us all more beers. Drake was tossing back Jack Daniels and chasing it with his beer. It was the first time I had actually seen him with a bottle in a week, and I had already gotten use to him being sober. I watched as he swallowed glass after glass and hated that I was witnessing the old Drake, not the new one that had laughed more in the past week than I had ever heard from him in the life time that I had known him.
When the bottle was empty I took it from his slackened fingers and pulled him up. “Let’s go, Drake,” I urged softly. “Time for bed.”
He sighed but didn’t resist. He stumbled a little as I helped him up the stairs. In his room, he just fell onto the bed, and I took off his shoes and jeans. But I wasn’t going to let him just pass out, not without an explanation. “So, what happened? You and Lana have a fight?”
“Yesterday,” he confirmed. “Crazy girl didn’t want me buying her things. Said that I was trying to buy her.” Drake laughed but it in no way held humor. “But I apologized today.”