Breathe Again (34 page)

“You must be Savannah.” His voice oozed roughness and raw need. I looked around, trying to work out what the hell was happening.

“And you are?” I asked with a raised brow.

“Colby, get the fuck away from her. She is Tate’s girl.” Blake came into view and glared at who I now knew was Colby.

Just hearing Blake’s voice caused my cheeks to ache from smiling so hard. Blake was now one of best friends, a friend who would call me out on my shit and would mock me until it ended with me jumping on his back and a rendition of UFC happening. That was Blake to me. His life was now about his band and traveling the world. Seeing him on television was surreal.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Colby, and it’s about time you got here, Blake.”

“Believe me, the pleasure is all mine.” Colby zoned his eyes into me hard and dangerously before he took off towards the bar, leaving me to stare at his retreating figure in confusion.

“Drummer or bassist?” I asked, turning my attention back to Blake, who was sitting at the edge of the pool with his legs dangling in the water and a beer in his hand. His usually cheery face was shadowed with something I couldn’t put my finger on. The Blake Ryan spark that was always on display was mimicked by dark circles and frown lines.

“He is our fearless drummer, but don’t mind him. He is on a self-imposed celibacy bout and he has this crazy idea that he can go without sex for the entire tour. I guarantee he will lose before the end of the day. He’d fuck anyone at the moment.”

My eyebrows shot up. “So I’m just anyone, am I?” I scoffed. “And here I was thinking I was something special.” Tauntingly, I pouted and folded my arms across my chest.

“Fuck, shit, no, Savannah. I didn’t mean that. You aren’t just anyone. Every single guy here wants to fuck you. I just meant he wouldn’t care whose pussy he dipped his cock into. Fuck, I didn’t mean that either. Sav you’re—”

Laughter roared from within me, so intense that I lost my footing and fell beneath the water. Choking and gasping for air as I rose, I focused on Blake and shook my head. “God, you crack me up, Blake. I’ve missed you.”

“I’ve missed you too, but enough of the sappiness.” Blake slipped into the water beside me and got straight to the point. “I need to know whether you and Tate have stopped being stubborn.” What the hell was it with this family and their lack of subtlety?

Tanzi floated towards us, hugging Blake quickly and then turning to me with a grin. “See? It’s not just me, Savannah. Seriously though, you are both so happy when you are loved up together. I miss the spark that I see when you two are together. I miss the happiness that I feel from both of you. You are the most perfect couple in every sense of the words. You just need to realize that.”

“I suddenly feel like I am being ganged up on.” I looked at Blake and Tanzi with a sly grin. “And for your information, I don’t kiss and tell unless I have copious amounts of tequila in my body, and if that’s the case, you’ll probably hear things about your brother neither of you wants to hear.”

Laughing at the looks on their face, I pulled myself out of the pool and walked towards the lounge to grab my sheer dress. Throwing my dress over my bikini, I headed to the bar for another cocktail. My eyes latched on to Colby’s tattooed back as he sat at the bar, leaning over a beer.

“So I hear you have a bet going with Blake?” I laughed, taking the vacant seat beside him. “You reckon you will win this little bet?”

“Lady, if you weren’t shacked up with Tate, I would be breaking all the rules with you right now.” His confidence was overwhelming yet refreshing. “But between you and me, I’ve already lost the bet. I’m just stringing Blake along for a bit.”

Colby turned towards the guy behind the bar and ordered me a Cosmopolitan and a Whiskey Sour for himself. I sat with Colby at the bar for a good hour. He told me how he met Blake, how long he had been playing drums for, and why he was a self-proclaimed pussy destroyer.

My attention faltered from Colby as my eyes landed on Blake, who sat on the edge of the pool, his eyes glued to a stunning brunette wearing a black bikini with the most impressive back tattoo I had ever seen. Blake’s complete focus was on her. His eyes were narrowed on her with an ownership I had seen so many times in the way his brother looked at me. His eyes followed Miss Stunning Brunette as she walked through the pool area towards Colby and me.

“Colby, do you know what time the club opening is?” Miss Stunning Brunette asked, her eyes quickly darting to me and then back to Colby.

“Ask Savannah. It’s her club.”

“Really? You own Red Velvet?” Her eyes widened as she held out her hand to me. “My name is Violet.”

“Hi, Violet. I’m Savannah. I don’t own Red Velvet my, um… Tate Connors owns it.”

Tate

W
HEN
I’
D
decided to invite Blake’s band to play at the opening of Red Velvet, I’d never expected to be now looking at a photo of their drummer with his hands all over Savannah. The photo my lovely and ever-so-kind sister had decided to send to me showed Sav in the arms of who I had learned was Colby. Luckily for my jealous streak, she looked somewhat uncomfortable and not enjoying it at all, but it did make my jealous streak rear its ugly head nonetheless. I wanted no one touching her. The caption ‘Do something about this before someone else gets her’ was all Tanzi had written and I knew exactly what her intentions were.

My day had been spent attached to my laptop working strenuously on the final details for the grand opening of Red Velvet Las Vegas. I had been working on this for months. I couldn’t even begin to think of how many times I’d signed my signature today or how many times I had said yes or no. It had been exhausting, and now, as the clock turned over to another day, I decided that I needed to call it a night.

As the cab drove through the bright lights of Vegas, my heavy eyes strained under the impending sleep that was tormenting me. Thankfully tomorrow I had some downtime and maybe I could finally talk to Savannah. I needed her to know that she owned my heart completely. I was sick of the distance, the games, the looks across the room, and the innocent brushes of our hands. That wasn’t us. I missed the intensity, the passion, the flirting, the argumentative streaks, I missed us. I wanted us again.

Slipping quietly into the hotel room, my eyes were instantly drawn to where I had hoped to find Sav. Every hope I had escaped my exhausted body the moment I found the empty bed. There was no sign that she had even been in the bed—the cover wasn’t turned down, the pillows weren’t showing the effects of someone lying on them. Nothing.

Shrugging off my jacket, I threw it on the floor and slumped down on the edge of the bed. My head hung in my hands while my mind took off in all directions of what-ifs and wicked scenarios. This was my one chance, my one fucking chance to make things right with us, and now somewhere in Las Vegas was the one person who had finally made me the man I wanted to be but she wasn’t with me. Welcome to Fucked-Up Town—population one.

“I was wondering when you’d get back.”

My head shot up from my hands as her voice floated through the air. In the darkness, in a whisper of candlelight, and in the lights coming through the windows, my eyes landed on a pure and honest beauty. Savannah lay bare, covered by bubbles in the freestanding bath. I stood from the bed, walked towards the glass wall, and leaned against the doorframe. My gaze roamed her face, untainted and clean, without an ounce of makeup, her hair pulled up on the top of her head like I’d always loved.

“I didn’t think you were here,” I admitted softly.

Her lips pouted as she slipped into thought. “Where did you think I’d be?”

“To be honest, I have no idea.”

“I’m not going anywhere, Tate.” Her eyes burned into mine with a promise of a thousand meanings. Her words echoed in my ears, repeating over and over again. She was here.

My fears of her leaving were unjustified. Her promise of a future cemented by five simple words was what I had to focus on. For once I didn’t think of who she could be with. For once I trusted her completely, without reluctance. The Tate of old would have been belting down Blake’s room demanding to know where Colby was, but that hadn’t crossed my mind once. Savannah wasn’t my past. She was my present and would be my only future.

“I figured it out,” I whispered.

The black and white of Savannah and Tate was being shattered by the hope of color. I saw what it was like now. We were far from perfect, but we were perfect for each other. Why strive for a perfection that wasn’t us? Our perfection was in the way we frustrated each other like no one else and in the way I missed her the second she wasn’t in my sight. Our perfection was in the way my heart hadn’t truly been beating until she had come into my life and in the way our demons tried to beat us but our angels joined as one to save us. That was our perfection.

“What have you figured out?”

“Us, I’ve figured us out.” I didn’t say another word. I spun on my heels, walked through the hotel room, grabbed my wallet, and escaped through the door with one focus taking over my thoughts. Midnight in Vegas didn’t mean a thing. I had something special to buy and I knew exactly where I was going.

F
INALLY, AT
one a.m. under the lights of Las Vegas I walked back into the foyer and made my way back to the confines of our room. Slipping out of my clothes and leaving on my boxers, I slipped under the covers and rolled to my side towards Sav. Sav’s lips were parted slightly as she slept, her hair sprayed out on the red sheets. My eyes fought the flirtation of sleep as long as I could before my eyes closed to the warmth of Sav’s body next to mine.

I woke to a jolt of sudden movement of the bed. Sav’s whimpers and her thrashing arms grabbed my attention and I fumbled for the bedside light switch. As light flooded the room, I grabbed her as panic filled me.

“Sav, wake up.” I shook her slightly desperate to pull her from her torment. “God damn it Sav.”

Suddenly, her tear-filled eyes shot open and she looked at me in fear. Her arms circled my waist as she clung to me for dear life. Without a word, she covered half my body with hers and buried her face into the crook of my neck, and within seconds, wetness from her tears greeted my skin.

“Talk to me, Sav.” My fingers ran through her hair, trying frantically to comfort her as she shook in my arms. “What’s going on?”

“I keep having nightmares about my parents and Mr. Davenport. They are always lying in coffins and I can’t reach them. I can’t bring them back to me.” Her head lifted from the confines of my neck and looked at me as if something had suddenly dawned on her. “But this one was different because you and Max were there.” My face must have showed my fear of her words. “No nothing like that. You were both calling out to me, begging me to come to you, trying to take me away from what I was looking at. You and Max were trying to protect me.”

“I can’t bring your parents back, Sav, but you should know that Max and I aren’t going anywhere, and Mr. Davenport is sticking around too. You don’t have anything to fear when it comes to us.” I kissed her forehead softly and she slowly nodded. Her head dropped to my chest and her body wrapped tightly around mine.

The extent of her grief from her parents’ death was something she dealt with daily, something she tried desperately to hide behind the tough exterior she wore. The thought that Mr. Davenport’s accident had brought up painful memories hadn’t sunk in until right now. What I didn’t know was how I could provide her with the security she needed? All I could do was be there for her, be her support, listen when she needed to talk, and distract her when I knew her mind would be going crazy just as I knew it was now.

“Did you buy a dress today?” I asked softly, my fingertips still running through her long hair.

“Yep I did. I can’t wait to wear it tomorrow night.” Her voice was barely a whisper.

“Are you going to be getting every guy’s attention in the bar?”

“There’s only one guy’s attention I want.”

“Colby’s?” I asked, the grin I was sporting able to be heard in my words.

“Yeah, definitely Colby’s. I might run off on tour with him so don’t wait up for me tomorrow night.”

“That’s not one bit funny, Savannah.”

“You brought it up. I think it was the bikini. It seems to do things to guys. You know what I mean, right?”

“Touché.”

Her muffled giggle was the last thing I heard before she fell into a deep sleep tucked up tight in my arms, and she didn’t leave the confines of my body all night.