Mason—the bastard, asshole, prick, dick—that he is, doubled over in laughter when he saw my face turn bright red at the same time I squealed, “I’m so sorry!”

No!

No!

When my Mason-imposter-clone turned around with wide eyes and a gaping mouth, I wanted to fall on the floor and die. Or blame it on Eli. But I couldn’t… because he wasn’t anywhere near me.

“Did you just kick him in the ass?” Mason cackled, holding his stomach with the palms of his hands.

I was mortified, beyond mortified, so far into the realm of mortification I couldn’t see the starting line; so it wasn’t too strange when my face got so hot it rivaled the maximum heating temperature my straightening iron was capable of. I was one of those people who acted like a complete ass when I was nervous. According to Eli and Laila, I acted like a complete ass all of the time, but when I was nervous it reached epic proportions.

“It was an accident!” I told the guy in front of me. I couldn’t look at him directly, not even close. Somehow, at some point, I’d linked my fingers together and covered my forehead with my palms without even noticing it. My eyes went wide as I dragged my hands down the sides of my face until I was cupping my cheeks. “I thought you were Mason” wheezed out of my mouth.

The real Mason only laughed harder from his spot ten feet away.

Out of nowhere, the guy in front of me, whose ass had just become friendly with my foot, laughed. It was a sweet, clear sound.

And it reminded me of the guy who had just finished singing.

No. Please, no. Don’t let it be him.

“It’s fine,” the warm voice chuckled.

Grumbling deep in my chest, at myself more than anything, an awkward smile covered my face as I finally started to shift my gaze, because what the hell else was I supposed to do? “I’m really—”

Tattoos.

All I caught at first was the thick swirl that painted his pectoral, followed by the tattooed bands of black ink that striped the length of his arm. Then there were the tattoos on half of his neck, located on the same side as his full-sleeve tattoo. Hello. Yeah, after the first quick glance I realized his imposter only had one full-sleeve tattoo versus two. Way to go, idiot. My friend didn’t have any tattoos on his chest, but it wasn’t like I’d seen him from the front beforehand anyway.

My eyes strayed back to the hard, flat muscles that packed his chest and checkered abs, and then the narrow hips that flowed seamlessly into the slim-fitting black slacks that had paraded around the stage less than an hour before.

Fuck my life. It was him. The singer for the band.

Whyyyyyy.

“I’m so sorry,” I breathed out, forcing myself to drag my eyes all the way up. If I kept on looking at his bare chest any longer, I’d officially earn my Hussy Merit Badge.

The guy was smirking at me, folding long, muscular arms across his chest. It was right then that I asked myself if I’d died. He was… I don’t think a proper word exists to describe the face above the body I’d been just short of ogling. Mason was a specimen worthy of all the attention he received, but this guy was… just… oof. Just as good looking in a completely different way, mainly because he wasn’t my lifelong friend whose looks I’d become almost desensitized to.

Most importantly though: I had just kicked a hot guy, a stranger, a man I was going to be spending the next three months with, in the ass.

Again I asked myself why. Why. Why hadn’t I just kept my foot to myself? All I wanted was to pull a turtle and hide in my shell.

As much as he looked like Mason from the neck down, their faces were very different. While Mase looked like a model for a cologne line, with his almost androgynous features that had gotten him called a pretty boy hundreds of times in the past, this other guy wasn’t so classic. His bone structure was a little harsher and his eyes deeper set. They both had black hair but it was cut differently. This man’s was shaved down at the sides, the top just a couple inches long, while my childhood friend’s hair was a good length all over. But still, the faint resemblance was there.

“E! Flabby kicked Sacha in the ass!” Mason cried out, basically cackling as he bent over from how hard he was laughing.

I felt Eliza’s heavy hand on my shoulder before I heard his snort. “Fucking Flabby,” my brother laughed, slipping a heavy and sweaty arm over me. “Does that mean I don’t have to introduce you after all?”

The man I could safely assume was Sacha—a guy, for the record, not the girl that the dumbass I’d shared a womb with led me to believe he was—shook his head before extending a hand out in my direction. “Sacha,” he said after I dropped my hands from my forehead and took my outstretched palm in his. “It’s nice to meet you, Flabby.”

The elbow I brought up to jab Eli in the rib was an after thought. “It’s Gaby, actually,” I tried to correct Sacha AKA hello-how-are-you-sexy, shaking the warm hand a little longer than I needed to. “It’s nice to meet you, too.”

Eli snorted again. “Don’t listen to her, her name’s Flabby, man.”

Sacha smiled again—a pull of sensual lips and straight white teeth—before he dropped his hand, eyeing Eli and me. “Are you two—?” He drew a straight, horizontal line in the air between us.

“Eww…” Eli and I both groaned out at the same time, shaking our heads quickly. It didn’t make us pull apart, though.

“I just barfed in my mouth,” Eli gagged. “This is my baby sister.”

The slow nod that Sacha gave us in return made it seem like he wasn’t entirely sure whether Eli was lying or not. Smart guy. You could never trust Eli Anthony Barreto. Ever.

“We’re twins,” I explained. “I’m filling in for Zeke the rest of the tour.” When Sacha quirked an eyebrow—a very dark one on his smooth, almost pale skin—I remembered that tonight would only be the bands’ fourth tour date together. He might not know who exactly Zeke was. “He was the old merch guy.”

By the way he nodded and snapped his fingers, it was obvious he hadn’t known Zeke’s name. “Right.”

Someone yelled from inside the bus, telling us to hurry up. Eli squeezed my shoulder. “Grab your stuff, stinky, and I’ll meet you inside.”

My stuff. The stranger’s butt. Ugh. My face got all hot again, and I found myself smiling nervously.

I nodded and watched my brother and Mason retreat into the bus, leaving me with the man whose ass I’d just kicked. He smiled and gestured toward the open compartment. “I’ll get your bag if you promise not to kick me again.”

Throwing my hands up in surrender, I shook my head. “No ass-kicking, I swear.” I couldn’t help but choke a little before adding, “I won’t call you a dick again either.” What was wrong with me? What I’d done was bad enough, and then calling him—well, Mason really—a dick was the cherry on a shit sundae.

He tipped his head back and laughed, the sound uninhibited and wonderful. “Deal.” A moment later, he was asking me which suitcase was mine prior to pulling it out. I started yanking out clean underwear, a shirt and sweatpants while he finally managed to retrieve the big black suitcase he’d been rummaging through when the ass-kicking incident happened.

Dread knotted my stomach as I remembered what I’d done. Humiliated, I zipped up my suitcase and shoved it back inside the compartment. “Your show was amazing,” I squeaked out, keeping my eyes toward the trailer hitched up to the bus. “I wasn’t sure what to expect, but it was great.”

“Thank you,” he murmured softly. It was impossible not to absorb the tone of his voice when he thanked me. There wasn’t a hint of superiority or conceitedness in it at all. He sounded pretty genuine. “First time?” he asked.

“Yes.” I found myself toeing the ground, feeling awkward. “I hadn’t heard of you guys before tonight.” For a split second, I thought about telling him that I thought his voice was beautiful, but I didn’t want to sound like a suck-up.

“I’m glad you liked it.” Sacha zipped up his suitcase, holding a bundle of clothes to his chest. He turned to look at me, a kind smile on his five o’clock-shadowed face. “Did you get what you needed?” I nodded and followed after him silently before he waved me into the bus first with the towel in his hand. He winked. “Don’t want you to forget about our deal so soon.”

Ugh. I was never going to live this down.

“I’m really, really sorry,” I insisted, still feeling horrible as I climbed up the steps into the bus. My face was getting red all over again.

Why the hell had I done that? My subconscious answered: because you really believed he was Mason, and if it had been, no one would have thought twice.

“Ladies and gentlemen!” my twin bellowed the moment I stepped a foot past the curtain and into the living space.

I stopped like an idiot, or better yet, like a deer caught in the headlights. Eli clapped loudly until the low buzzing of chatter inside stopped. I couldn’t help but notice that there really weren’t any ladies on the bus besides me—unless you counted Mason and Gordo—and I knew my twin well enough to accept that he wouldn’t refer to me as a female. “Everyone, now that the asshole we kicked off the bus earlier today is gone, I want to introduce y’all to our newest addition.”

He reached out to grab my hand, throwing up both our arms like I’d won a boxing match. “This is my baby sister, Gaby. She’ll be with us for the next few months.” He shook my hand, still in mid-air. “Flabby, say hi,” he instructed me as if I was a little kid. Fucking Eli.

I grinned nervously at the five new faces looking me intently, and let my brother wave my hand for me. “Hi, guys.”

A low murmur of multiple “Hi” greetings were spoken while I yanked my hand away from Eli’s grasp. At that very instant a hand landed on the small of my back. Turning my head over my shoulder just barely, I saw that it was the only person it could have been—Sacha. Up close and under the decent lighting of the bus, his skin looked clear and a little glossy from how sweaty he’d become during the concert. He really was good-looking, and a little taller than Mase as well.

“Don’t bend over in front of her. She likes to kick people in the ass,” he laughed, giving me a sly smile before shimmying his way around us to walk to the back of the bus.

I groaned to myself while Eli and Mason laughed like it was the funniest thing they’d ever heard. Minutes later, I found myself squished between Mase and Gordo while the bus driver steered the traveling hotel and trailer to where I’d been informed we’d be showering that night. The couches on either side of the bus were long, but it seemed like everyone was crammed into that front area closest to the door, including the narrow kitchen and bathroom. After the mini tour Eliza had given me hours before, I knew that past the door by the bathroom were the twelve bunks we’d be sleeping in, and at the farthest end of the bus was a small room with a U-shaped couch along the walls.

Mason introduced me to two of the guys from The Cloud Collision, a big muscular guy named Julian and a lanky one named Isaiah that I recognized as being the guitar players for the band. I caught Sacha standing in the kitchen, drinking something steaming from a ceramic mug, still half-naked. Still unbelievably hot, if not hotter than before. The yellow lighting in the bus did wonders for the lean cut of his chest and for his narrow hips with their cut oblique muscles, all of which then did wonders for my panties—I mean my hormones.

“You should wear shirts like that more often.”

I slid my gaze over to Mason, whose entire side was pressed against mine. I shouldn’t have been as surprised to see his eyes on my “shirt,” and by my shirt, I really meant my breasts. The tank top had begun to ride low enough so that the edge of my lavender bra was visible. Instead of replying, I frowned and tugged my shirt up enough so at least the girls weren’t hanging out so much… since half an inch of boobage was apparently too much to begin with.

When I met Mason’s gaze again he was smirking, looking entirely too pleased with himself. “I can still see them.”

“No way.” I rolled my eyes, trying not to be too self-conscious. It wasn’t like I didn’t get the same reaction from him every time we saw each other over the last three years. Well, it was the same reaction from just about every guy that wasn’t my brothers or dad. I’d spent ten years of my life trying to keep people’s attentions away from my chest and now, after everything, I still didn’t want people looking there for longer than a quick glance.

Gordo nudged me from his spot on my other side. With hair so dark it was almost blue, a beard that was so thick and wiry it could pass as pubic hair and his naturally dark skin tone even tanner than normal, his face was one of the most familiar things in my life. “Are we going to be on the same team together?”

“The same team…?” And then I remembered what team he was talking about. “Hell, no.” No, no, no, no.

“Oh come on, Flabs,” Gordo insisted, his dark, nearly pupil-less eyes narrowing.

Mason, who was still leaning forward, rested his forearm on my knee. “You’re already trying to choose teams, asshole?”

“I’m not playing, so he can’t be trying to choose teams.” I made sure to look both of them in the eye so that they would know I wasn’t playing around. I wasn’t going to play ever again.

“You have to play,” the man whose real name was Luis Alberto claimed. “It’s our tradition.”

What it really was, was a yearly tradition of humiliation and physical pain. I shook my head at Gordo. “It’s not happening, Gordis.”

“You’re playing,” Mason reiterated, eyeing my boobs again in a gesture that was intentionally meant to annoy the shit out of me. Really, I didn’t think he liked my breasts that much, it wasn’t like I had a D cup size, much less the Double-D size he usually salivated over, but irritating me was definitely at the top of his list of things he enjoyed. “I need those puppies on my team.”

I smiled at him sweetly.

There was a time, immediately after my surgery, that I had really tried to get him to quit making comments about my chest. For about six months straight he’d revolved between calling me Hooters and Twin Peaks. In typical Mason fashion, me complaining only made him do it more often. So I stopped telling him anything because I knew he really he did it to get a rise out of me. Instead I just began handling it differently.

I reached under his arm to twist his nipple, an easy thing to do because he was shirtless. “I’m not playing and if I was, I definitely wouldn’t be playing on your team, jackass,” I said, turning the beady pink nip sharply as he leaned away with a grimace and an ugly “Nooooo!”

The words had barely left my mouth when the bus pulled into a brightly lit travel center with a gas station, twenty-four-hour restaurant and restroom facilities. Eli tossed me a towel before everyone except Mason, who had his arms crossed over his bare chest like that would protect him from me, piled out of the bus with our belongings and headed inside. It was then that I realized I’d forgotten to bring shampoo and soap with me from home. I groaned and peeked inside, realizing that if I went into the showers after I paid, I couldn’t come back out for free.

I waited outside the men’s bathroom for a few minutes, hoping Eliza or Gordo would hurry up and come out so I could borrow their soap and shampoo. Less than ten minutes later, the smacking of flip-flops on the floor got louder and louder.

But it wasn’t Eli or Gordo coming out.

It was Mason 2.0 in basketball shorts, a T-shirt and flip-flops, making his way out with a backpack over his shoulder and black dress shoes hanging off his fingers. He smiled genuinely the instant he saw me standing there looking like a hobo asking for a handout.

“Everything okay?” he asked, making me feel like a total mess.

I nodded, my face immediately flushing at the memory that I’d kicked this poor guy in the ass just minutes ago. I cleared my throat when my ears got hot too. “Yeah, I’m just waiting for Eli.”

Sacha raised a dark eyebrow, giving me a chance to take in the smoky, nearly transparent gray of his eyes. He glanced at the clothes in my hands before pursing his lips. “Did you forget your soap?”

I was a little hesitant to admit it, but I did, fighting the urge to rub at my ears. “Yeah.”

He smiled.

“I want to borrow his,” I explained.

Sacha didn’t hesitate a second. “Here,” he said as soon as I’d finished talking. Thrusting a bottle of some 3-in-1 shampoo, conditioner and body wash at me, he shrugged. “It isn’t for girls—”

This man had another thing coming to him if he thought I cared what I used for toiletries. I’d even be willing to share with Mason—the disgusting ass of the year—if I knew he didn’t borrow someone else’s on the rare occasion he decided to shower. I took the bottle from him and smiled, the embarrassment that had been swimming along my spine earlier from what I’d done disappearing at his kindness. “I have invisible balls, it’s cool,” I told him like I would have told Eli… and immediately regretted it. It wasn’t like I thought we were flirting or anything, and the fact I definitely wasn’t looking my best didn’t escape me, but that didn’t mean I wanted him to think of me as… well, I didn’t know what. Unattractive, I guess? Manly? It didn’t help that I was still mortified over the kicking incident.

Sacha laughed that cute, bright laugh that made me smile despite everything. “All right, invisi-balls. Have at it.”

“Thanks. I owe you,” I said a little more shyly than I normally would have. Walking backward toward the entrance to the bathroom at his command, I gave him another awkward wave I immediately regretted. Good God, I was on a roll and needed to quit while I was ahead.

He simply nodded at me before I ran into the area where the showers were. I rushed through mine as quickly as I could, not caring in the least that I smelled like a clean guy. As soon as I finished drying off and dressing, I hustled out feeling way better than before. Luckily, my brother was waiting for me right outside the restrooms.

“I was gonna give you five more minutes before I went in there,” he warned. “I thought somebody kidnapped you.” Those green eyes so much like mine, peered at my feet, earning me a frown. “Where are your flip-flops, and why are you holding men’s shampoo?” A smirk covered his mouth a second later. “You finally decided to go through with that surgery, huh?”

I snorted and socked him right in the stomach as I walked by him. “That Sacha guy let me borrow his shampoo because I didn’t bring any and you were taking forever douching in there.” I hiked my thumb toward the restroom as Eli rubbed where I’d nailed him. “And I didn’t bring flip-flops with me. Why?”

He grimaced, eyeing my feet again. “You stepped on that floor without shoes on?” When I nodded in response, he shuddered. I glanced at his feet to see he was wearing a pair of rubber thong flip-flops. “You better pray tonight.”

When Eli gives you a reason to pray, you better pray. I just didn’t know what I was supposed to be praying for. Back when we toured in Old Pepe, we always showered in hotel rooms. This travel-center-showering was a new experience for me.

We made our way into the bus, where I handed Sacha his shampoo back with a “thank you” while my brother made us three packets of ramen noodles to share, sixty-forty style with pieces of grilled deli chicken thrown in. He promised to take me to buy groceries, cheap sandals and shampoo the next day. As soon as we finished eating, I walked by another member of The Cloud Collision, who had some Middle Eastern ancestry in him. He was on the phone, so I raised my hand in a wave and he did the same back before I followed Eli into the bunk area.

“Mine is that one,” my brother said, pointing at a top bunk with its curtain pulled all the way back. There were twelve total bunks with crimson curtains, three stacked on top of each other, six on one side of the hallway, six on the other. He then pointed at the bottom bunk, below where Gordo was sleeping at the top. “Zeke slept on that one. It’s yours now. I put my backup sheets on there for you earlier.”

I immediately thought of Zeke drooling over the bed—or worse. Yuck.

“Thanks.”

It was then that the curtain on the bunk above mine slid open, and I fist-pumped in my brain because sane people don’t do that in real life. Sacha looked at me from his spot in the bed above the one I’d be taking. “Hi, neighbor.”