CHAPTER 67

JARED

A week.

A fucking week. That was how long it had been since I’d woken up to a severely pissed-off Gerry telling me I was being accused, of all things, of being a father. It was ridiculous.

And yet, it had taken the whole week for us to get this far.

Alicia sat on my left around a conference table in one of the big conference rooms on the top floor of Gerry’s office building. The sun was so bright, I had to shield my eyes as I looked out the window, but Gerry, sitting to my right, noticed and hit a button that automatically lowered the blinds.

True to his word, Gerry had demanded a blood test from Madison, and we were waiting on a courier to deliver the results. Frustrated rage was rolling off me in waves, and Alicia put her hand quickly to the side of my thigh, squeezing me lightly. Telling me to calm down.

Glancing at her, I tried to accept the small amount of comfort she was offering me by that light touch.

Then I realized that more than being appreciative and grateful for her being by my side and trying to comfort me, she was one of the big reasons I was so wound up about these lies. I was worried about what she thought of me, about what would happen with us because of them.

I couldn’t remember the last time I gave a flying fuck about what anyone thought of me, but I was genuinely worried now. What did all of this look like to her?

Madison couldn’t be … pregnant. I swallowed past a bitter taste in my mouth just from thinking the word. Condoms failed all the time. I knew that. But I was careful, so she couldn’t be … that word.

If she was, though, what would Alicia say, think? Would she put my sorry ass behind her or stick by me? Fuck. This was all so new to me. And it was getting to me—all of it. My leg started bouncing against Alicia’s, and again her small hand was there, her palm pushing down on my thigh.

She’s here. She’s not leaving. Yet.

Fuck.

Either way, I would find out today. And tomorrow, I was going on tour. By tomorrow night, I would be standing onstage in front of thousands of fans for the first full concert on the Imperial Inspection Tour and know whether I was becoming a father or not.

If I was, it could throw a motherfucking wrench the size of a continent into the plan. I had no idea what Madison would want from me other than a shit ton of money, I was assuming.

My leg started bouncing again. Where the fuck was this courier?

Gerry’s phone buzzed at that exact moment, and he excused himself, doing up the button on his jacket as he rose. “Excuse me. The courier is here. I’ll be right back.”

He strode from the room with a confident gait, and the tension between Alicia and me was palpable as we waited for him to come back, which happened not a minute later. Holding up the sealed envelope once he got back to the table, he tore it open and read the results.

My heart was pounding, but his expression was unreadable as he handed the results to me. I ripped the paper containing my fate from his hands, but then my eyes refused to drop. I gulped air into my lungs, desperate for oxygen that didn’t feel like it was reaching my brain. My vision blurred. This was it.

Squeezing my eyes shut, I took a breath and manned the fuck up. I didn’t bother to read half the crap printed on the paper, zeroing in on the two most important words that jumped out at me like flashing beacons of salvation.

NOT PREGNANT.

I blinked hard. Once. Twice. Again. The words didn’t change.

I was on my feet before I knew it, throwing my fist up and then bringing my elbow back to my side in a swift punch. “Fuck, yeah. I told you it wasn’t true.”

Gerry chuckled, and Alicia looked stunned for a second before her lips pulled up into the most relieved smile. “I take it the baby’s not yours?”

Shaking my head, I pulled her to her feet and lifted her right off them in a hug I had to force myself to loosen so I wouldn’t hurt her. “She’s not even pregnant.”

“Thank god,” Alicia breathed against my hair, her entire body relaxing. Gerry cleared his throat, reminding me of his presence.

Quickly replaying my reaction in my mind, I decided that my hugging Alicia probably didn’t look too suspicious. If I let her go now.

Reluctantly, I set her down on her feet again as Gerry rose to his and stuck out his hand to shake mine. “You were right. Congratulations, Jared. I didn’t doubt you for a second, but let’s never talk about this again. My heart won’t be able to take it.”

“Never another word.” I grasped his hand. “Thanks, Gerry.”

His pale blue eyes crinkled at the corners as he smiled a relieved smile. “Now get your ass home and your bags packed. It’s time to shine, Larsen. Go make me proud. Get out of here.”

Lifting my fingers to my forehead in a salute, I snapped them back down and matched his grin, relief lifting the weight that’d been on my shoulders all week. “We’re gonna do our best. Good luck with the treatment, man. Keep us in the loop.”

Gerry made a circular motion with his index finger. “You’ll be the first to know.”

“Good.” Preparing for tour while knowing Gerry wasn’t coming with us had been weird, to say the least. At least he’d been around all week dealing with the Madison shit storm with me, but it still felt wrong he wasn’t involved in any of the tour arrangements. “We’re gonna miss you out there.”

He clutched my shoulder, moving his head from side to side. “Nah. You won’t even notice I’m not there. Have fun. Just not, you know, not too much fun.”

Alicia laughed at my side, moving in to give Gerry a quick hug. “I’ll keep them out of trouble. You just focus on getting better. We’re going to need you here when you get back.”

“Then, here is where I’ll be,” Gerry assured her. He was putting up a good front, but I could see this sucked as much for him as it did for us.

But we all had to do what had to be done. With that in mind, I placed my palm on the small of Alicia’s back and walked her to the door. We both turned to wave at Gerry, standing behind the seat he’d vacated with both hands on its backrest. “See you around.”

“See you around,” I called out as Alicia preceded me out the door. Gerry had asked us to meet him at the office while we waited for the results, but now we both had to get the final packing done before we left home for the next few months.

I was pretty much packed, and Alicia, being the organized person she was, had been packed and ready to leave for days so she could pay attention to finalizing the last details instead of worrying about what she was going to wear when we got there—her words.

Walking into the humid parking garage with Alicia, I slung my arm over her shoulders. “You still coming over later?”

“If I don’t get arrested for murdering an assistant first,” she joked. Maybe. She’d been having some trouble getting a response out of one of the venue coordinators, and I knew she was frustrated as hell. Along with all the added work caused by the rumors of Madison’s pregnancy, my poor girl’d had a hell of a week.

Sighing, she shrugged out of my hold. “But yeah, I’ll probably be at your place around six. Hopefully.”

“If you’re not, I’ll swing by the police station and bail you out.” Hooking my arm around her waist, I jerked her closer to me and kissed the top of her head. “See you at six.”

Alicia smiled and took off in her little red Audi, loud music blaring from her radio as she raced out of the garage. I spent the rest of the afternoon going through my pre-tour motions, which meant I made sure everything was set at home and then lay out in the sun at the pool listening to my old favorite get-psyched songs and thinking about the one other thing I still had to do.

My head was all over the place all afternoon, but by the time six rolled around and Alicia arrived, I knew there were a couple of things I needed to say to her before we left on tour. I buzzed her in, trying to convince my damn heartbeat to slow down.

None of what I was about to say was normal for me. Jesus. I felt like a teenager.

Alicia was oblivious to my crisis of confidence, throwing her purse down on my couch before turning, hands on her hips as she raved about the incompetence of some of the people she’d dealt with since leaving the office this morning.

“And then,” her eyes flashed in irritation, knuckles whitening as her fingers tightened on her navy pencil skirt, “he told me having double the number of people at the meet-and-greet wouldn’t be a problem. Can you believe his audacity? You’ll be there all damn night with that many people.”

“Asshole,” I muttered, but I didn’t give a shit about the meet-and-greet. I was listening to her, but it was really hard to focus on anything other than her standing in the middle of my living room looking the way she did.

She might not have realized it, but she’d come to a standstill right in the center of the spacious room. Soft light from the sunset outside made her loose hair almost glow where it fell past her shoulders. Lights were blinking on in the city below, making it look like she was on a postcard in front of the wide windows.

One heel clicked against the floor in her annoyance, eyes and stance fierce. She was fucking beautiful and brilliant.

Yanking me from my thoughts, she snapped, “Are you even listening?”

I closed the distance between us, winding my hands into her hair, my mouth crashing down on hers. Kissing her so hard, my lips stung, I was breathless when I released her. “I was listening, but I couldn’t stop thinking about doing that.”

Dazed, she blinked up at me, heat sparking in her sapphire eyes. “What was that for?”

“For believing me enough to stand by me this week.”

She frowned. “Jared, I—”

I gently brought a finger to her lips. “I’m not stupid. I know you must’ve wondered, but you stuck around anyway. That means something to me. A lot, actually.”

“I was just—”

“Doing your job,” I finished for her, a smile tugging at my lips. “Thing is, I don’t believe that anymore. The stuff you do for me goes way beyond the line of duty.”

Her eyes flitted from mine. “Maybe.”

“Hey.” I lifted her chin and held it between my fingers so she would look at me. I needed her looking at me when I said this. “It’s okay. What I feel for you, it …”

A strangled sigh escaped as I searched for the right words. Fuck. Why was it so much easier to write or sing than it was to talk? “This week was torture for me. I honestly don’t know what I would’ve done if Madison was pregnant with my baby. And not because of the kid. It would’ve been hard, but I would’ve learned to live with it.”

“Why then?” she whispered, tentative for the first time since I’d met her.

“Because of you.” Trailing my fingers across the soft skin of her cheek, I marveled at the way she leaned into my touch. She was precious to me, this girl. Everything she did and said and was, it was everything I never knew I needed in my life. She was everything. “Because it would've ruined things between us, and I couldn’t live with that.”

“Why?”

Christ. She was killing me with that question. Inching so close to her, I could feel her heart pounding almost as fast as mine was, I said the words I never in a hundred years saw myself saying to a woman. “Because I love you, Alicia Diamond. Somehow, some way, I broke all my own fuckin’ rules, and I fell in love with you. And I think, unless you’re the hardest, most dedicated worker of all time, that you love me too.”

Stunned silence followed my life-changing declaration. If I thought the word “why” was killing me before, I was wrong. The silence, that was what was really killing me. Her eyebrows jumped to her hair, and her eyes popped wide open.

Twin orbs of the clearest blue, the color of the ocean on a sunny day, stared up at me. She didn’t even blink.

“I, uh.” I started to turn away from her. Shit. What a colossal fucking mistake. “I—”

She grabbed hold of my arm, finally blinking as the corners of her lips lifted into what grew to become a radiant smile. “Give me second here, you fool. For a guy who can’t even admit we’re in a relationship, you just shocked the hell out of me. Of course, I love you too. I lo—”

I wanted to hear her say it again and again. And then again. But I needed to kiss her more than I needed my next breath or anything else in the world. Cutting her off by claiming her mouth with mine, I wrapped my arms around her and lifted her against me.

Her skirt bunched between us as she wound her legs around my hips, her arms winding around my neck. I felt her smiling against my lips before she broke the kiss. “I love you, Jared Larsen. I never thought I would be able to say those words out loud, but I love you too.”

Heart clenching and constricting in my chest, I knew in that moment that I was forever changed. There was no going back from this. Nor would I ever want to. A piece of her lodged in my heart right there. Irremovably, irrevocably, it now had her name written all over it in flashing neon letters.

My heart belonged to her. My soul belonged to her. I belonged to her.