Mended (Connections, #3)(25)

A devilish grin appears on his face. “No. It’s a yoga swing. But thanks for the idea,” Garrett tells her.

“Fuck, no, not in here,” Nix calls out from behind one of the curtains. “No one wants to see your naked ass in the act.”

Leif comes out of the bathroom wearing some kind of sleep pants that make me laugh equally as hard—they’re baby blue with an elastic waist, and I wonder if they’re Ivy’s. Holding my stomach, I try to calm myself. Garrett gives me a perplexed look. I know he must be thinking he’s probably never seen me laugh this much, and I don’t remember the last time I did. Leif, with his toothbrush in his mouth, shrugs past as if nothing out of the ordinary is occurring and disappears into his cubby. Nix pops his head out and starts talking to Garrett about setting some new rules.

I take the opportunity to get Ivy’s attention. Moving directly behind her, I clutch her arm and pull her back to me. “Can I talk to you back in the lounge?” Her laughter stops when I whisper in her ear, “Please.”

She turns to look at me, her eyes unreadable. “Okay.”

I turn and she follows. I fight the urge to hold her hand. We enter the front lounge again and she moves to one side. I lean against the small counter opposite her. “I’m sorry. That was a shit thing to say. I didn’t mean it like it sounded. What I meant to say was what made you decide to debut with a pop song?”

She sighs and sits back down, sipping from the mug she’d left behind. Silence is all around us before she answers, and the room seems much bigger than it actually is. “First, yes, it was a shitty thing to say. But to answer your question, it was my only choice. I’d been back in LA for six months and hadn’t found a job. I was singing at the coffee shop my mother worked at. Damon had been going in there for years and she had told him about me. He came to one of the open-mic shows and afterward asked to meet with me. When I first met him, I was determined to put out the album I had always dreamed of. He disagreed with my vision. He said the marketability of what I proposed wouldn’t work in the climate we were in at the time. So I left. Then about a week later he talked to my mother. He called me back and agreed to cut a demo of one of my songs. It took another three months before it went out, and I still hadn’t found a job. He finally sent it out, but we never heard back from a single label. In the meantime I’d managed to get a job working for an advertising agency writing jingles—I hated it. A year later I decided to do it his way. And even though the album didn’t hit the top of the charts—I was still happier.”

“That doesn’t make sense. No one was interested in your first song, but he found a label to pick up the album after that?”

She looks up at me with her blue eyes, the softness in them draining by the second. She rises and walks to the small sink next to where I’m standing. She rinses her mug, sets it down, and turns her head toward me. “Xander, I’m not sure what you’re implying, but Damon has always had my best interests at heart. In fact, we’re working on a new sound now—or we were.”

It’s unlike me to hold back on how I feel, but I’m aware she doesn’t trust me yet, so I put my hands up in surrender. “I didn’t mean it that way.”

She reaches for a banana and peels it, not responding to my comment. I’m really curious why Damon would switch gears, so I ask, “What kind of new sound?”

“Well, not new. Old might be a better explanation.”

I nod, understanding what she means.

“We both agreed I’d take a break and refocus, redirect my music to what I envisioned when I first started singing. I’ve written songs and hit the studio attempting to produce them. We’ve tried a few different producers, but I’m still not happy with the results.”

“Can I listen to them sometime? You can tell me what it is you don’t like and maybe I can help you.”

She chews a bite of banana, swallows, takes another bite, as if strongly considering my request. “I’d actually really like that.”

She makes the simple statement and I want to press her for more. I want to listen to her new songs now. I want to talk to her more about her music. I don’t want this conversation to end. But silence rises up between us again. She throws the banana peel away, and then her head drops and she stares into the sink. When I brace my arms back on the counter, our hands are so close all I’d have to do is move my thumb a fraction of an inch and we’d accidentally be touching. But instead I do something I know I shouldn’t. I lift my hand and gently grasp her chin, pulling it toward me. “Ivy?” I ask. “You okay?”

“Yes,” she answers, closing her eyes.

I breathe out. She breathes in. I can feel my skin touching hers and I want to hold her, rest my forehead on hers, I want to brush my lips across hers, I want to whisper in her ear that she can trust me. Having her this close twists me, turns me, makes me think about my actions. I don’t want to upset her. It’s been almost two weeks since she joined the band and our conversations have mostly been work-related until now. This is the first personal conversation we’ve had, and talking to her again has everything inside me screaming for her. Everything she does sets my blood on fire. I drop my hand and back away. I’m going to give her some time because that’s something we have—three months’ worth of it.

“I’m really going to get changed now,” she says, her voice smooth and low.