Chapter Nineteen

Isaac knew exactly where he was—on the beach at the cove where he and Oliver spent most of their summers. What he couldn’t figure out was why. He hadn’t been here in five years. And yet he felt the heat of the sun on his face, smelled the salt in the air. He was here…but where was Oliver?

Shading his eyes, he scanned the length of the beach. There, at the end near the cliffs, he could see his friend’s sandy blond hair. Oliver was headed into the water.

Isaac stood, brushing the sand off his shorts as he jogged toward the cliffs. Oliver was knee-deep now, but when Isaac called out to him, he didn’t stop. Every step took him deeper, farther away, and no matter how hard he ran, Isaac knew he’d never catch his friend. He watched, helpless, as Oliver sank beneath the waves—

Salt water choked him. He gasped instinctively, trying to get air, but more water flooded in instead. Salt stung his eyes and nose and throat, adding to the pain, but no matter how hard he swam, the surface stayed just out of reach. Just…out of…reach…

His body seized, desperate for oxygen. Don’t give in! Don’t give in! But slowly the light of the sun blinked into darkness.

“No!”

He shot up in bed, gasping for air, dragging it into his aching lungs. Holy shit. His chest hurt like a son of a bitch, and he rubbed at it, trying to ease the pain. Trying to figure out where the hell he was and why he felt like he had been thrown into the deep end of a pool with a boulder tied to his—

“Isaac.”

Kennedy. She appeared beside him like magic, only she was real; he knew it this time. Her hand felt warm, her touch steadying him. The light scent of her shampoo filled his nose, and bare skin met his arm.

He forced his eyes open. They were in his bed in the penthouse; Kennedy was as naked as he was. Gripping her hand hard against his chest, he let the memories flood in.

He’d tied her last night.

He’d been dreaming.

Oliver.

He was out of the bed before he’d even realized he was going, staggering toward the balcony doors, lungs too tight to do more than gasp for breath. Opening the curtain revealed the pinkish glow of dawn on the rugged horizon. He’d stood here so many times since he’d come to the Sovereign, and yet, this morning, the peace the view held couldn’t touch the agony in his heart.

Minutes later Kennedy eased up behind him, her cheek settling in the hollow of his spine, her arms coming around to pull his chilled body against the warmth of hers. Their roles were reversed—or maybe not. She was simply giving what she knew he needed, and in that moment he needed her holding him, giving him the strength he didn’t have. Keeping the pieces of him together before they shattered apart.

Hooking his arm over her head, he dragged her in front of him. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“You didn’t.”

She shivered against him. Despite the heat of her body, the air-conditioned room had drawn goose bumps over his skin.

He tried to clear some of the gravel from his voice. “Come back to bed, love.”

She let him lead her, let him tuck her under the covers with him and draw her close. The pile of pillows propped behind him raised him just enough that he could look down into her wide green eyes, see the canvas of pink that dawn painted on her skin. The clock over her shoulder read six a.m. “What’s got you up so early?” After last night they both should’ve slept till noon at least.

She rubbed her cheek into the hollow below his collarbone. “Everything. You. Thinking.”

Alarm jangled his already frayed nerves. “Second thoughts?” He forced his muscles to stay relaxed, not wanting her to realize how desperately he needed her answer.

“No.” Kennedy kept her gaze on her hand above his heart, but one leg settled across his, intertwining them. Reassuring him. “It’s just…a lot to take in.”

He shifted to his side and slid his knee between hers. “Discovering new aspects of ourselves usually is.”

“Mm.”

Snuggled close, her breasts were soft mounds against his chest. She had beautiful breasts, full and round and topped with nipples that turned strawberry-pink when he teased them. Remembering how they looked last night with his clamps, he felt his cock stir.

“You were having a nightmare.”

And…no more stirring. The darkness of the dream washed over him again; all he could get out was a grunt of agreement. When Kennedy met his eyes, the worry he saw there made his chest ache all over again.

“I’m sorry.” He hooked a runaway strand of fire-red hair with his finger and smoothed it back behind her ear. “That’s not how I intended to wake you up this morning.”

A half-hearted smile tugged at her lips. “Do you… Would it help to talk about it?”

Probably. Not that he wanted to. But then he thought back to last night and the trust Kennedy had shown him.

Leaning back on the pillows, he drew her over him until she sprawled across his chest, needing her grounding him as he ventured back into the darkness. “It was a nightmare.”

She gave him a look, one he imagined sent her subordinates in the office scrambling to please. “I kinda figured that out. Wanna try again?”

How could she make him smile right now? “Watch it, Sassy. You know what happens when your tongue runs away with you.”

“You come?”

He managed to keep his amusement controlled long enough to throw the covers back and land an openhanded slap on her bare ass. Only then, when she was sputtering and rubbing the offended spot, her eyes sparking with promised retribution, did he let the laughter out. Gripping her chin, he consumed her outrage with his kiss.

She flashed him a look when he finally let go. “What happened to Mr. I Don’t Do Morning Kisses?” she asked, keeping her tone carefully neutral. Probably to avoid another spanking.

He hadn’t even hesitated. “It seems like you’re the exception to a lot of my rules, Ken.”

Pleasure softened her eyes, her mouth. “Then talk to me. I want to be here for you as much as you’re here for me. That’s allowed despite the big bad Dom-ness, right?”

“In D/s? Of course it is.” He took the curl that lay on her shoulder between his thumb and finger, rubbing the silky-smooth strands over and over. “And even if there was some rule we had to follow—which there isn’t; BDSM is as individual as the people who practice it—it wouldn’t affect us. Our relationship will be what we make it. So yes, I want you to be here for me too.”

Which meant he had to follow through with responding, didn’t it? At least Kennedy’s playfulness had eased the tightness in his throat, his heart. “For the past few months I’ve been having nightmares about Oliver.”

“Your friend? Why are they nightmares?” she asked quietly.

“Because they’re of him dying, only it’s not Oliver. It’s me. I’m dying, drowning just like he did.”

Kennedy’s breath hitched. Her arms clutched at him, as if by sheer force of will she could keep him with her, away from the dreams, away from death. He had no doubt she was strong enough to do just that.

“That’s awful. When did they start?”

He had to think back; so much of the last few months had been crowded with tour dates and traveling and the worry over not being able to write music. “Around the time Grace first started talking about the benefit, I think. That’s the first time it truly hit me that it had been five years since Oliver…”

Kennedy rubbed a warm hand along his ribs. “It’s normal for grief to come back around anniversaries, isn’t it?”

True. And some of what he was feeling was grief. Tear-your-heart-out, can’t-do-anything-but-scream grief. But the rest…

“I’m not just grieving; I’m angry. How fucked up is that? Sometimes, when I think about losing him, I’m just so angry it burns up everything else inside me.” The distinctive burn of tears tingled at the back of his eyes, but he blinked it away. “It wasn’t like that when I first lost him. My parents had thrown me out just after, and I was trying to move to a new country, trying to find a place to live, start a new career. But the past few months…”

A shot of pain zinged through his jaw—he was clenching his teeth. Kennedy must’ve seen it too, because she brought a hand up to massage his jawline. “Hey.” She pushed up onto her elbow to stare down at him. “You have every right to be angry. People don’t like to say it out loud, but it’s there. As much as you loved Oliver, what he chose to do, what he took from you, from Grace…” She shook her head. “There is nothing wrong with being angry.”

“With who? There’s no one to target, no one to fight it out with. Oliver is dead.” As much as the words stabbed a knife through his heart even now, they were true. “He can’t say he’s sorry.”

“No, he can’t.” Kennedy crawled up until her head was level with his on the pillow. “But that doesn’t mean you can’t do something about it on your end. Before it eats you up inside. Before these nightmares lead to something worse.”

She was right; he knew she was right. He just didn’t know what to do about it.

Except that wasn’t totally true. He did know; he just didn’t want to face it. Hadn’t for five years. “Grace called.”

A vee formed between Kennedy’s brows. “When?”

“Yesterday. Her headliner for the benefit quit.” He dug his fingers through Kennedy’s thick hair, playing with the strands, untangling them, giving himself a focus. “She told me in no uncertain terms that she expected me back for the concert. No excuses.” He stared into her eyes, the sympathy staring back at him hard to take, but he forced himself to anyway.

“Maybe it’s time,” she said. “Maybe that’s what your heart is trying to tell you.”

He shook his head. “I don’t know if I can go back. All this time it was like, if I just stayed away, it hadn’t really happened, you know? He would still be there at the cove, waiting for me, giving me shit for being five years late.” His breath hitched in his throat, nearly choking him. “If I went back—

“And what, am I supposed to stand up on a stage in front of thousands of people and talk about him, about how he was a brother to me and left me behind? How suicide isn’t the answer?” Things he could no longer say to Oliver because his friend was gone?

“I say you know that better than anyone, don’t you? You live out the consequences every day: a big gaping hole in your heart where your brother used to be. That hole’s only going to get bigger if you don’t deal with it.”

He had felt like there was a hole in his heart—Christ, maybe even his soul. And the past few months, it had been swallowing him up. His happiness. His drive. His music.

He thought about the sensations in his dream, of drowning like Oliver had. It wasn’t happening in real life, but there were parts of him that were dying, weren’t there? If he didn’t face his pain and anger, didn’t put the past completely to rest, what would happen to his creativity?

He had to make a choice. And staring into Kennedy’s eyes, he knew what his answer would be. He wouldn’t settle for less courage in himself than he’d seen in his woman.

“I haven’t been able to write,” he told her. “My record label wants a projected date on the next album, and I haven’t been able to give them one. I was beginning to think there wouldn’t be another one if I couldn’t get my head on fucking straight.”

“Beginning to think?”

“Yeah.” This time he rose on his elbow, tipping Kennedy onto her back where he could look her square in the eyes. “Until a certain redhead became something of a muse. I’ve got half a song just imagining having you beneath me.”

“Half?” Kennedy wiggled a bit beneath him, and his cock took notice. “I think we can do better than half.”

“Oh, last night was a whole album, love. Don’t sell yourself short.”

Her laugh was the best music in the world. He savored it, let it surround him. He’d known this woman only a few days, but he hadn’t needed more than a few hours to know she was a gift he had no intention of letting go. Wherever this took them, he wanted to follow it. And he prayed he’d never find the end.

“Would you come to Australia with me?”

Kennedy startled. “Me? You want me with you?”

He rolled his eyes at the question.

Kennedy snickered. When she tweaked his nipple, he was on her instantly, growling into her neck as she tried to escape his tickling fingers.

“Okay, okay, okay! I submit,” she cried. And she did, relaxing beneath him as sweetly as she had last night. The feel of her surrender pierced his heart in a way he didn’t think he could describe, even with music.

He eased back, the smile on her face making his chest expand in a totally Neanderthal—and totally uncontrollable—way.

“Of course I want you with me. But I need to hear you say it.”

“Well then”—she trailed her fingers down his side to cup his ass, pulling him harder against her—“yes, sir.”