Natalie had walked through the door, a bright smile on her face and a gigantic rock on her finger. As for Morris, his normally stoic face radiated satisfaction with a hint of smugness.

Liam stiffened beside me.

“Natalie! Let me see it again!” Jessie threw her tray onto a table and rushed over. “It’s so beautiful,” she sighed as she examined the ring. “The diamond is so clear and sparkling, and the setting is just gorgeous. Take notes,” Jessie called over her shoulder to Gael.

I thought my brother might flinch at the thought of rings and marriage, but he blew her a kiss. Maybe I should have been worried about alien body-snatchers after all.

“Hey, Cerise,” Morris said quietly.

A wave of nausea came over me. I couldn’t face Morris. He’d take one look at me and know I was upset, angry, heartbroken — I was consumed with a dozen different emotions and he’d be able to sense them all.

But I couldn’t ignore him, not with everyone else there.

“Hey.” I plastered a smile on my face, the corners of my mouth only twitching down slightly. “I’m sorry I didn’t get to say congratulations yesterday.”

“Can we talk?” he asked.

Bile rose to my throat. I wasn’t ready for this conversation.

“I’m sort of in the middle of a drinking game,” I said.

“Please?”

Shit.

I took in a heavy breath and nodded. “Let’s talk somewhere private.”

I didn’t need the entire bar to hear this.

We went to the back room full of extra chairs and stacks of boxes. There was barely enough room for two people to maneuver around. I turned to face Morris, dreading what was coming.

“I have something to ask you,” he said.

I braced myself.

“Will you write a song with me?”

My whirling thoughts halted. I stared at Morris, confused.

“A song?”

“It’s the anniversary of…” he trailed off, his brown eyes wounded.

He didn’t need to say it. I’d been counting down the days in my head for the last few weeks.

“We should write a song,” he continued. “Together. In his memory.”

I could feel the mass of darkness roiling inside me, waiting to be released.

“No,” I said.

Morris’s brow furrowed. “No?”

“I don’t— I haven’t—” My breath caught in my throat. “I only ever wrote songs with him.”

“I know,” he said gently. “I was the same. Never joined another band. Not until Kell,” he said, referring to his lead singer, the one who’d recruited him to Feral Silence. “But this will be good. For both of us.”

“Like… closure?”

He shrugged his broad shoulders. “Whatever you want to call it.”

I went silent, thinking it over. Most of the songs I’d ever written had been about Harper. Before his death it was all passion and love and desire. After his death, heartbreak and turmoil and loss.

When comparing the songs between my first band and Cherry Lips, it was like they’d been composed by two completely different people.

And they had been. The current me was nothing like the old Cerise.

Or, at least, I hadn’t been until recently.

Something inside me changed as soon as Liam walked back into my life.

I felt… whole.

“Think about it?” Morris said to fill the silence. “I want to write that song with you.”

I nodded slowly. “Okay. I’ll think about it.”

Even as I said the words, my chest ached. That small, miserable part of me kept remembering awful things. I wished I could banish it forever, but it felt like it had been with me for so long. I didn’t know how to make it go away.

Morris held out his hands. I stepped into the circle of his arms. One large palm cupped the back of my head. I pressed my face into his chest.

I tried not to feel the absence of Harper's presence in his embrace.

“Morris.” Liam’s flat voice spoke from the doorway.

I stepped back from the hug, blinking back tears.

“Natalie wants you,” Liam told him.

Morris patted me on the shoulder and, after eyeing Liam carefully, went back into the main bar.

“What was that about?” Liam asked.

“Morris wanted to—”

“Write a song with you,” he interrupted. “Yeah. I heard.” His green eyes, normally so good-natured, were narrowed in suspicion. “I thought you didn’t write songs with people.”

“I don’t normally but—”

“I asked you to write a song with me and you wouldn't,” Liam cut me off again. His tone was oddly heated. And not in the good way. “But you’ll write one with him.”

“I’m thinking about it.” I frowned at him. “Why are you acting so weird over this?”

“Why do you think?”

“You’re upset because of a song?”

“I’m upset because I walk in here and see my girlfriend with another man,” he growled. “An engaged man, might I add.”

A shot of disbelief went through me. “And what exactly do you think was happening between us? If you’re trying to insinuate something—”

“You won’t write a song with me, you won’t tell the band about us—”

“Are you mad about that?” I asked, still taken aback by the turn of our conversation. “I thought we agreed to keep it to ourselves for now.”

“And how long is for now going to last?” he snapped. “Are you just biding your time with me? Are you just waiting for their relationship to fall apart so you can be with him?”

I pressed my lips together firmly. “Liam. I warned you. I won’t date someone who has trust issues.”

“And I’m not going to date a girl who’s in love with another man.” His eyes blazed with fury. “I’m not going to date a girl who will end up cheating on me with someone else.”

Shock flew through my system, sending me reeling, before I was overtaken by outrage.

“Are you fucking serious right now?” I made my voice low, matching the fire in his eyes with ice of my own. “Did you really just accuse me of cheating?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “Maybe you’re not right now. But how do I know you won’t just go running after him the first chance you get?”

My vision went white with anger. “Is that really what you think I’m going to do?”

“I don’t want you seeing him anymore.”

Liam’s words had a sense of finality to them. As if they were the last words he was ever going to say.

But I had a world of words to shoot back at him.

“You don’t get to dictate who my friends are,” I bit out. “You don’t get to come in here and throw a fit of jealousy. And you sure as fuck don’t get to accuse me of cheating on you.”

We stared each other down. The scowl on his face matched my own.

“If you see him again, we’re over,” Liam said.

My lips curled into a snarl. “We were over the minute you accused me of sleeping around behind your back.”

And for once, I didn’t regret whirling around on my heel and leaving.