Chapter 15

Mason

I entered the living room to find Nolan, Jared, Kirk, and Aaron taking up all the available seating—leaving me with no choice but to stand. On the mantel, the antique clock counted down the seconds until they would deliver my sentence. Tick. Tock. Tick-you-are-royally-screwed. Tock.

“Did I miss anything while I was gone?” I asked, doing my best to buy time before the shit hit the fan.

Nolan’s gaze jumped from Jared to Kirk, then to Aaron. They nodded for him to speak. “You didn’t. But apparently we did,” he said. “What’s this crap about you hiring your friend’s sister without consulting us first? This band is a democracy. Which means we all get to vote on the person we want to hire—not just you.”

Knowing I wouldn’t be able to joke my way out of this, I held my hands up, surrendering to my fate. “Look, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about Nicole sooner. Her brother is overseas, serving with the navy. He was worried about her when he couldn’t get hold of her, and asked me to see if she was okay.”

“I gather she was fine,” Jared said, sitting next to Kirk on the couch, his arms folded across his chest. “So why did it take you so long to get back?”

I snorted. “I would’ve thought you’d be too busy screwing your new wife to notice I was gone. Obviously you’ve got your priorities fucked up.”

He huffed a laugh. “Don’t worry about me, Mas. I’ve got my priorities figured out just fine. Kirk filled me in on your absence.”

“So if Nicole was fine,” Aaron said, “why not return to L.A. as soon as you figured it out?”

“Because I needed a break before we started touring again, so I decided to stay there for a few days.”

“What you’re really saying”—he leveled his gaze at me—“is that because you were too busy fucking your friend’s sister, you couldn’t be bothered to return until today?”

Ouch. Guess I deserved that…mostly because it was true. “Actually, that’s not the reason. She needed help fixing things around the house, so I stuck around to help her out.” At least it wasn’t a complete lie. “She and her friend own a floral business, but there was a fire in the building a few days ago. Their store suffered major smoke and water damage. It will be a few months before they can open it again, and since we’d already agreed to hire someone to handle our social media, I thought Nicole could do it in the meantime.

“And she is a great choice,” I added. “She does the social media for her business and has a marketing degree. She knows what she’s doing.”

“So the only reason you hired her was because of her qualifications, and not because she’s a nice piece of ass?” Aaron asked, one eyebrow raised.

Tick. Tock.

“Her being pretty has nothing to do with it.” It didn’t hurt, though.

“And where’s she going to sleep while we’re touring?” Nolan asked, still not looking thrilled about the situation. None of the guys did.

“The same place as us. On the bus.”

He leaned forward in the armchair, elbows on knees. “Our bus?”

“Of course. How’s she going to pretend to be us on social media if she’s not around us?”

“What Nolan is asking,” Kirk said, “is where are you planning for her to sleep on the bus? If she’s our employee, that means you can’t be fucking her.”

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.

I bit back what I had planned to say, because that wouldn’t help the situation. Besides, I didn’t want them to believe that was the real reason I’d brought Nicole back with me. I also didn’t care to admit that something about her had gotten under my skin and I wasn’t ready to walk away from her just yet.

“She can stay in the back room.” In addition to the narrow bunk beds in the middle of the bus, there was a small back room with a larger bed, where Hailey and Callie stayed whenever they visited Nolan and Jared. But other than that, the room remained empty. And because of that, it had become an unofficial storage room.

“And what happens when Hailey or Callie join us?” Kirk asked.

“Then Nicole can bunk on whichever bed is vacated when that happens. It’s not like Nolan and Jared stay in their bunks whenever Hailey or Callie visit.” Although in Jared’s case, Logan usually took over his bunk so his parents could spend some private moments together without the four-year-old. Not that he knew it.

“And she’s okay sleeping on the bus with us?” Aaron asked, sounding somewhat doubtful a woman would want to do that if she wasn’t involved with one of us…unless she had other motives. Like when the last girl Aaron had hooked up with had joined us on tour with the goal of exposing us in ways we didn’t wish to be exposed.

“Why wouldn’t she be? It’s not like we’re going to hurt her. And she’ll be our employee, which means we have control over what she can say. It will be in the contract.” The same confidentiality clause all employees of Pushing Limits and Endless Motion had to sign. Anyone who violated the agreement would be facing a lawsuit.

“All right,” Nolan said. “I’m fine with it if everyone else agrees to hiring her. But”—he gestured at me with his finger—“like Kirk pointed out, if she’s our employee, then you can’t fuck her. At all.”

The loud, crisp chime of the antique clock intruded on the meeting, as if to voice its opinion. I had a feeling its vote wasn’t in my favor.

For a second I considered reminding them that she was my friend’s little sister, but while Zack might have believed I wouldn’t do something as low as fuck her, the guys clearly thought otherwise.

“Fine.” But since she wasn’t our employee yet, technically I could have sex with her one more time before we hit the road. I kept that to myself. It was bad enough they’d already guessed what she and I had been up to. I just hoped they didn’t hold it against her.

The women were still chatting when we joined them outside. Hailey and Callie wrapped their arms around their guys’ waists, making the most of the time with them before our tour bus would pull away tomorrow.

My fingers itched to touch Nicole, but I suspected this would also be a violation of the upcoming contract. And although it wasn’t an issue until the contract actually arrived, there was no point flaunting the fact that I planned to ignore the no-sex rule for tonight.

“Hey, Logan,” I said, needing to find a way to distract my thoughts from what I intended to do to Nicole tonight. “You want to play soccer?” I signed “soccer.”

“Yay!” was his answer. Like at Jared’s wedding, we divided into teams, although this time we didn’t have as many players.

“I’ll play,” Nicole said when we realized Logan’s team had one less player than mine.

We got into position, Nicole barefoot. Callie, who was officiating the game, threw the ball in. It landed on the grass closer to Logan, and he kicked the ball down the pint-sized field as Callie and Beckie cheered him on. He giggled as he kicked it into the goal past Hailey, who used to play on a women’s collegiate team. She pretended to block him but didn’t put any effort into it.

Hailey kicked the ball to Nicole. She easily gained control of it and dribbled it toward my goal, which was nothing more than two deck chairs set two yards apart. And damn, was that girl good, especially considering she wasn’t wearing shoes.

I saw it on Aaron’s face the moment it hit him that Nicole knew exactly what she was doing. Nolan and Hailey weren’t the only talented players in the group.

Also realizing this, Jared made a play to stop her, but he failed to block her in time. She kicked the ball and sent it sailing toward the kid-sized goal. Aaron dove at the ball, but he wasn’t fast enough. It traveled under his outstretched hands.

“You never mentioned she could play,” Nolan said.

“I didn’t know. But with her on our team, the roadies don’t have a chance of beating us.” Like with our last tour, for this tour we’d found roadies who loved playing soccer whenever we all had a chance. And most of them had grown up playing the sport, which left us outmatched.

But not this time.

The guys couldn’t fault my decision to hire Nicole now.

“Where did you learn to play like that?” I asked her.

“Zack. As you know, he played soccer in high school and taught me a thing or two.”

“I’d say more than a thing or two,” Hailey said.

“And there’s a chance I might’ve played it in high school and college,” Nicole said, laughing.

“That would do it,” Hailey replied with a huge grin.

At one point the teams were tied as Nicole dribbled toward Aaron, who was guarding my team’s goal. No way was I letting her score again…completely on principle, mind you. I wrapped my arms around her waist, pulling her against me.

Laughing, she kicked the ball to Hailey, seemingly unaffected by our closeness—unlike me. Desire shot through me at the feel of her warm, soft body against mine.

Hailey passed the ball to Nolan and scored. Callie blew the whistle, signaling the end of the game. We shook hands with the opposition, even though what I really wanted to do was kiss Nicole long and hard. As it was, after tonight I wouldn’t get to do that anymore.

The evening wound down around nine o’clock, with Jared and Callie needing to take a very tired Logan home to bed. He could barely keep his eyes open.

“Remember,” Jared said to me, “we need to meet at the mall parking lot at seven tomorrow morning. If you’re late, we’ll have to leave without you.”

I snorted. “Right, as if you would do that.”

Kirk slapped me on the back. “Just like you’d never tell the bus driver I was napping when I’d told you I was going for a run?”

“Hey, I couldn’t help that he misunderstood me.” Or that he understood me perfectly and no one had questioned why Kirk wasn’t on the bus when we pulled away from the parking lot.

Kirk rolled his eyes but didn’t say anything else, having long since gotten over what happened.

Nicole said goodbye to the women and promised to keep an eye on their men. “Don’t worry, I’ll fight off the groupies with my bare hands if I have to,” she said, smiling.

“What, not only are you our social media person,” I said, “you’re also Nolan’s and Jared’s bodyguard?” I grinned and addressed the two of them. “You guys need to develop some fucking balls if a bunch of barely dressed women scare you.”

I reached back and removed my wallet from my pocket, then pulled out two bucks and handed the money to Logan. I figured using “balls” in the context that I had would result in a penalty, like saying “fucking” did. Might as well save me time—and a lecture.

I pretended to look remorseful as I gave him the money, but then winked at him. He giggled—with Jared no doubt mentally cursing me for corrupting his son.

“You’re really good with Logan,” Nicole said as we drove back to my loft.

“He’s a cute kid.”

With a sigh, like the one all women let out when they’re fantasizing about having children one day, she shook her head. “That’s true, but you’re also a natural when it comes to kids. Just like you were with Bree the other day.”

I barked a laugh. “I somehow think Jared and Callie will disagree with you there.”

“But not Logan. He looks up to you.”

“That’s because I’m six-two and he’s barely three feet.” Although I couldn’t see Nicole because I was watching the road, I was certain she was rolling her eyes.

“That’s not what I meant and you know it. It’s hard to explain, but it’s like he worships you.”

“That’s because I’m unofficially funding his college education with my inability to quit swearing around him.”

Nicole’s laugh was possibly the hottest sound I’d ever heard, and my dick got excited. Like it normally did whenever she laughed. “I’m sure that doesn’t hurt either. But like I said, you’ll make a great father one day.”

No, my dad had been a great father, even if he did turn his back on me. But that was completely my fault. I couldn’t blame him for that. Until I screwed things up for the tenth time, he had always been there for me. If I had a child, I wouldn’t be around for him the same way my father had been there for me. The band came first—always would.

As we drove Nicole and I lapsed into silence, but not the uncomfortable kind. The kind that felt like everything was all right with the world, even when it wasn’t. “So how come I didn’t know you played soccer?” I finally asked. “You impressed the hell out of Nolan.”

“I don’t know—it just never came up. So, does that mean I’m now in when it comes to the job? That’s what the meeting was really about, wasn’t it?”

I’d hoped it wasn’t so obvious. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“C’mon, Mason. Are you seriously telling me that tonight wasn’t the first time they’d heard that I’d accepted the position?” She didn’t sound pissed, so that was good. Actually, she seemed more curious than anything else.

“We did need someone to help us out, but we hadn’t gotten around to hiring anyone. I just took the initiative and hired you for the interim. Besides, you’re qualified for the job.” Other than the part where I’d been fucking her during the past few days. “Your credentials speak for themselves. Plus Callie and Hailey like you, so that made it a done deal in Jared’s and Nolan’s eyes.”

“And it didn’t hurt that I could play soccer, huh?” she said, laughter in her voice.

“If you could play hockey, I wouldn’t be surprised if Kirk offered to marry you.”

“He likes hockey?”

“That would be like asking if penguins like cold weather. Rumor has it he was headed to play in the NHL.”

“So what happened?”

I shrugged. “No one knows exactly. He doesn’t talk about it.” Time to rip off the Band-Aid. “There’s one thing I should tell you.” I briefly tore my gaze off the road and looked at her. She was watching me expectantly, her slightly parted lips begging me to skim my tongue over them and taste her.

I pulled my attention back to the road. “After tonight, we can’t do what we’ve been doing.”

“You mean we can’t be friends with benefits?”

My ego might have felt a whole lot better if she could’ve at least pretended to be disappointed at the news. “That’s right.”

“Why after tonight?”

“I was hoping we can still screw around tonight…” One side of my mouth curled up. “For old times’ sake.”

She laughed. Despite the bruising my ego had just taken, I took this as a good sign.