Alcohol You Later (19)

I’m still taking it all in when he collapses on top of me, bracing his weight on his forearms. “This is where the magic’s gonna happen,” he says, rocking his hips back and forth to make the bed squeak.

I love it when he’s like this…playful and carefree. For the first time since I arrived yesterday, I’m seeing glimpses of the man I fell in love with.

When he locks his hungry eyes with mine and waggles his brows seductively, I lose myself to a fit of laughter. “How long have you wanted to say that?”

He pinches my nipple ring through my tee, giving it a gentle tug. That, coupled with the way he’s biting on his lush lower lip, sends blood rushing to my core. “Since the first time I watched an episode of MTV Cribs.”

“Holy shit!” His mention of cribs reminds me of where we are—on Justin fucking Baldwin’s bus. I give him a shove, knocking him to his back, then straddle his denim-clad crotch while whipping my hand in circles above my head and rotating my hips. “We’re gonna do the nasty where Justin and Helena get down and dirty.”

He throws an arm over his eyes, like he’s too embarrassed on my behalf to even look at me, and he shakes his head. “You’re such a little fan girl.”

I choose to ignore his attempted insult. “Get it?” I ask, creating a drumroll on his chest with my pointer fingers for effect. “Like his hit single, ‘Down and Dirty’?”

“I got it, babe.” Reaching up with both hands, he curls his fingers around my nape and lowers my face to his. “Haven’t you realized by now that we’re all just regular people?”

There is nothing “regular” about this man, fame be damned. But his head is big enough as it is, so I’ll let him think it.

I dart my tongue out and flick it over the tip of his nose. “You’re just regular people…but Justin… that fine-ass man is country music royalty,” I taunt.

“That little punk ain’t got shit on me.” His nostrils flare like the bull that he is.

“Think so?”

“Know so,” he growls, reaching under the hem of my shirt, “and so do you, but I have no issue with reminding you over and over…” He pulls my bra down, causing my tits to spring from the top, “and over again.” Craning his neck, he brings his head to my chest.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Just as his lips brush my erect nipples…

A retching noise fills my ears.

I yank my shirt back down at the gagging coming from the doorway, where I turn to find Lyle with his finger down his throat. He looks every bit the five-year-old who’s just caught his parents kissing in the kitchen. My face is radiating with mortification as I reach through the neck of my tee to return my breasts to their cotton and wire prison.

“Bro,” Nick groans. “You’re this close,” he pinches his fingers together, leaving not even a hair’s width between them, “to a fuckin’ ass whoopin’.”

“Yeah, well, Rhett said you can watch your own kids and sent me to deliver them; you know, since Korie’s puking her guts up with morning sickness.” His quirked brow is filled with judgment.

“Shit,” I say, clambering to my feet. “I feel awful.”

“Not your fault, babe,” Lyle says, sliding to the side so I can get passed him in my mad dash from the room.

“But it is,” I call back. “I asked her to watch the babies…not Nick.”

Guilt has me heading straight for the kids, tuning the guys’ heated conversation out.

“Hey babies,” I sing, joining them on the white leather sectional in front of the TV. “Cocomelon, huh?” I may be a single woman with no children of her own, but I am in the know when it comes to the itty-bitties. This show is crack for my students.

Ava looks up from the purple sucker that’s dribbling down her chin and all over her pink dress. She literally beams when she sees it’s me, and my heart swells ten sizes. “Is that good?”

She nods, holding it out for me to taste. “Bite?”

“I don’t want any. Thank you.”

“Hmm-humm,” she hums to the tune of “you’re welcome.”

Sweet girl.

Now it’s her brother’s turn to shove his in my face. “You’re so sweet, Alex. Thank you.” I take the sticky orange candy from him when he won’t take no for an answer, pretending to have a lick before handing it back.

His smile is so much like his daddy’s that it steals my breath away.

I feel myself falling hard and fast for Nick’s children… and it should probably scare me more than it does, because he is dead set on giving them away at the end of his contracted time.

But if I, of all people, can love his children despite my battered and bruised heart, I just know it’s only a matter of time before he falls head over feet as well.

He has to…





After Raven and I were so rudely interrupted, I had to get off that bus.

When I walked past her and the babies, and saw the look of sheer disappointment on her face, it damn near did me in.

I know what she wants from me. I just don’t think she realizes that I’m incapable of delivering it. I’m not the white knight. And certainly no one’s Prince Charming. The sooner she accepts that, the better off we’ll all be.