Thoughtful (Thoughtless, #1.5)(94)

“Bye, Denny.” I laid my head on the table after he left. I am a horrible, horrible person.

When Kiera came back downstairs, I was in the living room, looking at a program running on the TV but not really seeing it. Kiera laughed as she joined me on the couch. Pointing to the TV, she said, “Sienna Sexton? I didn’t realize you were a fan.”

I finally tuned in to what was playing—a documentary on the biggest pop star on the planet. Finding the remote, I shut it off. “I’m not,” I told her with a smile. My grin slipped as guilt washed over me. “You missed Denny leaving. He told me to tell you goodbye.”

Kiera’s expression went from amused to horrified. “Oh…” She looked down, and seemed unsure what to do with that information. Join the club.

She was a good person, and the paradox bothered her, which made me feel even worse. Even when I tried to do the right thing, I hurt her. All of this was so strange, complicated, and painful. I wished I could have her and avoid all the tangled bits, but that wasn’t my reality. I grabbed her hand and interlaced our fingers, reaffirming our profound connection. This was our reality, and I would hold on to it. Kicking and screaming if I had to.

We held each other after that, until finally it was time for us to begin our day. The afternoon went normally enough; I took her to school, picked her up afterward, took her home, and then helped her study. I took her to work, then met up with the guys for rehearsal. After fine-tuning some of our songs, the lot of us descended on Pete’s for some liquid refreshments. A pretty typical day.

Leaning back in my chair, I listened as Matt told me about how his grandpa wanted to come up for the holidays, but he hated to fly. Pointing over at Griffin, Matt said, “The rocket scientist over there told him he should drive.”

I shrugged. That didn’t sound completely unreasonable to me, but by the smirk on Matt’s face, there was a catch. “Let me guess, he doesn’t own a car?”

Matt’s smile grew. “Oh no, he does. It’s parked in his garage. In his house. On Maui.”

Griffin scowled as Matt and I started laughing. “What? There’s gotta be a ferry or some shit like that that he could take. Hawaii isn’t that far away.” Griffin grinned. “Maybe he could sign up for a singles cruise. Get lei’d while he’s getting laid.”

Matt made a disgusted face while I laughed even more. Griffin might actually be onto something with that last suggestion. Well, minus the getting laid, of course. Unless his grandpa wanted to. He was related to Griffin as well as Matt, so he could be randy as all get out. The thought gave me a shiver and I looked around the bar to clear the image of Griffin’s personality in an old man’s body.

My gaze passed over a table of women giggling and staring my way, obviously trying to get my attention. I continued on past them until I found Kiera. She was frowning when our eyes met. She quickly fixed her face, but too late; I’d already seen the sadness. Was she still sad about this morning, or was something else bothering her? She wasn’t having second thoughts about us—was she?

I slowly got up and walked over to her. My heart started thudding as I approached where she was wiping down a table. If she ended this, I had no idea what I would do. When I was right beside her, I rested my hand on the table, close enough to hers that our fingers touched. “Hey.”

“Hi.” She looked up at me with a shy smile that made her even more incredibly beautiful. My heart squeezed. Don’t end this yet. I need you. Almost like she could hear me, she straightened and stepped closer, until our bodies were touching.

We were really close together, closer than friends would stand. Even though the bar was busy, our proximity was odd. I didn’t care though. I needed to know what she’d been thinking about. We were close enough for me to discreetly stroke her pant leg with my finger. “You looked like you were thinking of something…unpleasant. Anything you want to talk about?”

Please, let it be anything other than you changing your mind. Don’t leave me.

She opened her mouth to answer, but stopped when Griffin walked over and clasped my shoulder. I could have turned around and slugged him. Instead, I stepped away from Kiera so he wouldn’t notice that he’d interrupted a moment. Not that Griffin ever paid close attention to things that didn’t involve him.

“Oh, man, you have got to see this little hottie at the bar,” he said, biting his knuckle. “She totally wants me…Think I could nail her in the back room?”

I glanced back at the girl that had Griffin in a tizzy. A pretty woman with long, straight brown hair was sitting on a bar stool, facing the crowd. She had on a tight, short dress, and with her legs crossed, she was showing a lot of thigh. Her eyes locked on me once I turned around and met her gaze. Biting her lip, she shifted in her seat like she was so turned on she couldn’t stand it. I wasn’t sure if she was interested in Griffin or not, but somebody could probably nail her in the back room; she was definitely primed and ready to go.

Eyes glued on me, the woman never once looked Griffin’s way. That seemed to clue him in that maybe it wasn’t him she was interested in. “Oh f*ck, man! Did you already bang her? God, I hate getting your seconds. They never shut up about—”

I was officially going to kill Griffin. Kiera hearing about the two of us sharing women was the last thing I wanted to happen. She’d be disgusted. I was disgusted. I knew it had probably happened before…but I really didn’t want to think about it, and I definitely didn’t want to talk about it. There were some things that were better left unspoken.