Scars and Songs (57 page)

“We’ve sung like that since my audition, haven’t we?”

“Yeah, we have.” 
Since the dawn of time, my love
.

Still touching my thumb lightly against her bottom lip, I slowly dipped my finger in, “All I thought about was what it was like to be buried between the lips of a woman who could sing like that.” 
It’s me, Selah.  Take me all, I’m yours to have forever
.

Her heart raced in her chest. I could
feel
it flutter like a butterfly’s wings against me, and mine matched its speed instantaneously.  Running my finger slowly along her jaw and down her neck, I brushed my lips against her cheek to her ear, “Why did you choose that song for us to sing?”

“I wanted to tell you how I felt.  Why I was always so mean to you, Shane,” she whispered.

Pulling my face back, I searched her eyes, hoping she’d really see me.  “Because you feel broken?”

Tears pooled in her eyes, “Completely shattered,” her voice whispered, cracking.  It tore at my heart. 
How will I ever make it up to her?  How could I ever make this better?
  Thousands of years of hurt and pain, of never knowing, of lies.  Alone.

I softly brushed away the tears that fell from her eyes.  She inhaled deeply as I slid my hands from the wet tears on her cheeks to take hold of her waist.
I gently rolled her over, sliding myself on top of her, my knee slipping between her thighs, opening them.  She trembled beneath me as I slowly leaned down, and then
she wrapped those gorgeous legs around me, holding me tight
.

I brought one hand back to her face, trailing my fingertips across her lips.  “Then let me in, because I promise you, I will pick up every little broken piece of you,
every single fucking piece, Grace.
For the rest of my fucking life, I will put you back together...I’ll make you whole again,” I whispered.

Both of us stopped breathing.  Time stopped, the world went on spinning, yet we were its only two inhabitants. 

I brought my lips to hers, and traced the outline of them; skimming so softly over them, touching and dragging so lightly over them, the warmth of her breathe mingling with mine.   While lacing my fingers through her hair, I parted her lips with mine and dipped my tongue in.  My body shuddered as her tongue met with mine and she moaned into my mouth.  Her hands raked up my arms, dug into the skin of my back, and we deepened our kiss.  We devoured each other’s lips, drowning completely, intensely in each other’s kisses.  Desperate, needy kisses. 

Leaning up on one arm, I clawed at the bottom of her shirt, yanking it up over her breasts.
Our lips parted just long enough to drag it over her head.  Grasping the back of her neck, I slammed her lips back against mine with a low growl.  My hands skimmed all over her bare skin, grasping, kneading. I couldn’t get close enough to her.  “I can get lost in your lips forever, Grace,” I whispered against her lips.  “So beautiful.  Perfect.”

Our lips were soft and teasing, then rough and wild.  My hands fisted in her hair, tongues dancing, grinding our bodies against each other.  Exhaling heavily into my mouth with shaking hands, she roughly tore at the waistband of my pants, pulling them down along my hips.   Sliding her hands over me, she gripped her warm hand around me. I bit down on her lip and moaned aloud at the intense sensation. 
Only she, only Grace could make me feel like this
.  I was lost to her; she had me so fucking completely.

“Hey!”

It was Tucker’s voice. 
Tucker’s voice?  What the hell?
   Then the reality hit me. Alex and Tucker were still in the room with us. 
Fuuucck, I moaned too damn loud
.  Both of us lay there, silent and not moving.  Her hand was still tightly around me and God forgive me, but I fucking slowly thrust myself against her.  It may have been even more than once. Honestly, I only stopped because she was shaking with laughter next to me, which kind of felt really fucking good too.

“Hey, Alex!  Get up!  Get up!  Shane’s about to bag Grace!”  A load smack and a cursing Alex were heard next.  Rolling away from Grace, I grabbed her tee shirt and yanked it back over her head. 

“Wait!  Hold on!  I need to get my camera phone!”  Alex drunkenly screamed from the floor, and then fell.  “You’re not thinking about OUR BLOG, Grace!”

I could barely make out Grace struggling to put her arms into her shirt, and Alex and Tucker falling over each other on the floor to be the first one to the light switch.  I tucked the covers over us, kissed her forehead quickly and leaned the back of my head on my arms on her headboard waiting for the light.

Tucker got to the switch first and flicked it on. Grace was innocently sitting up on the other side of the bed from me cross-legged with her hands folded in her lap over the tucked up blankets. 
God, she was beautiful
.

Tucker looked like a rabid dog, all foaming at the mouth, red-faced and baring his teeth. “Alex. 
I’mnotfuckingkidding
I heard them
kissingandshit!
” he slurred.  Pointing his finger at me and spitting, “What the fuck were you guys just doing?  I know those sounds,” he yelled.

I looked over at Grace innocently and she shrugged then yawned, “We were sleeping until some drunk asshole sleeping on my floor woke us up with his screaming.”  Tucker punched his pillow a few times.

But Alex?  Alex, sat back and looked back and forth between Grace and me, then he drunkenly smirked at me.  Then he winked. 
And blew kisses at me
.

“Fine!” Tucker screamed.  “I’m going to take a fucking piss.”  He stumbled over his sleeping bag and fell, and then crawled to the door.  Before he tumbled through it, he turned back and faced me, “Remember you robbing-fucking-backstabber, she was with me
first!  The fucking minute you toss her for something new, I’m all over that ass.” 
Yeah. Definitely not happening
. 
Yeah, I’m going to go beat the shit of that prick right now
.  I flung the blankets off my legs to go after the dick, but Grace’s hand grabbed for mine and she entwined her fingers to mine, holding me back.

Tucker flicked the light off and he fell against the wall in the hallway giggling and cursing, then slammed the bathroom door.  He started singing immediately after.

Alex’s deep chuckles filled the room.  “Whoa, Tucker has serious issues.  Everybody knows Shane wouldn’t sleep with someone in his band, that’s against the rules, right, bro?”  Silence.  Grace squeezed my hand tight.
 
“Oh, and hey, Grace?  You might want to turn your shirt right side out again,” Alex said bursting out in laughter.  “I’ll never be so drunk that I can’t tell if a chick is dressed wrong, that’s for damn sure.”

Son of a…
Ah, it was pretty funny
.  I laughed back, “Dude, why don’t you find another room to sleep in?”

Alex’s dark figure moved around on the floor getting more comfortable in his sleeping bag, “Nuh, uh.  But, if you’re changing the rules of the band, I’m all for watching.” 
Then he made kissing noises
.

“You’re disgusting,” Grace laughed next to me.

I grabbed one of the pillows behind my head and pegged it where I thought Alex was lying on the floor.  “Hey, thanks, bro.  I need a little somethin’ to hold down here.”

I slid my arms around Grace and pulled her across the empty space between us into my arms.  “Don’t worry, Grace.  I’m sure you’ve heard all those rumors about Alex and me having a torrid affair that we don’t want our fans to know about.  Well, it’s true, and he really just wants to watch me, not you.”  I teased her about what she and Lea told those two blondes at the bar about Alex and me, so they’d stay away from us. 

She laughed loudly and burrowed her face in my neck, “Oh God, you heard what we said to those girls, huh?”

I held her tighter and said, “It was brilliant.  I don’t want any of them, they’re not you,” I whispered.  Her body stilled but she didn’t say anything back to me.

I brought my lips to her neck and peppered light kisses along her skin, “Hey, Alex?” I called.

“Yeah, dude?” he answered.

“Desperately want to change the band rules,” I whispered.

“I don’t blame you one damn bit.  But, Shane, if you hurt her, we’ll kill you.”

I ran my lips over her shoulder and pressed a kiss right over the tattoo of her broken angel’s wing,
my wings
.  The part of her body she marked with my story, with my fall; how she loved so fiercely the angel I was.  I wished I could be that perfect being for her still; she deserves a god for what she lived through. “Then I’ll be living forever.”

“Um, you guys know I’m still right here
, right?  All this bromantic talk is making me think I should leave the room and let the both of you sleep on the bed.”

I squeezed her tighter, tucking my hands around her belly and laughed, “Shut up and go to sleep, Grace.”

A few moments after, Tucker stumbled back into the room, fell over Alex and then fell back asleep.  Alex cursed at him for the full five minutes it took for Alex to get out from underneath him, until his words lulled into soft snores.  Grace and I laughed quietly into each other.

When I knew they were both asleep, I softly
tucked her hair behind her ear and whispered, “Grace?”

“Yeah?” she asked lifting her head a bit.

“What
did
you do with Tucker when you went out with him?”

She rolled over and looked directly into my eyes in the dark.  “He just kissed me in his car.  He tried to do more, but I didn’t want to.  I don’t like him like that.”

I squeezed my eyes shut tight and clenched my teeth.  His lips on hers,
I want to kill him
.  “No more,” I whispered.

“No more what?”

“No more kissing anyone but me,” I said. 

Her breath quickened and her lips were on mine, consuming me.  “No more,” she whispered when she broke free, then cuddled closer to me and we drifted off to sleep.

I woke slowly, at first, not realizing where I was, brighter and brighter the light shined behind my closed eyelids.  Stealing my darkness.  The bed underneath me felt like the softest most exquisite place to lie and the silky strands of hair that fanned out, that my head lay softly against, smelled of wildflowers and heaven.  Delicately, the slow slide of my hand beneath the covers met with smooth bare skin tangled with mine.

My eyes fluttered open to the afternoon sun streaming through the open curtains of the window.  I lay on my back and Grace,
my Grace
, was tucked tightly into my side, half her body draped across my bare chest, our legs tangled with each other’s under the sheets. 

Skimming my fingertips under her shirt and down her spine, a raw heat spread across my body, a desperate need to have her.

Then Grace shifted in her sleep, her sweet lips brushing against the bare skin of my chest, one hand spreading itself over my flesh, sliding down the muscles of my stomach. 
Fuuccck, my body was on fire, burning to be inside her
.

Her body was so damn warm and soft against me.  Then she cuddled closer against me, shifting her body with a deliciously erotic slowness over mine, so that our bodies were perfectly aligned together.  My rigid hardness was throbbing like a caged animal against her hot center. 
Please, please, please let us be alone in this room right now
.

Letting out a deep groan against her silky skin, I slid my body completely over hers, the tense muscles of my thigh gliding teasingly against the V-shape of her pajama bottoms.  Torturously slow, I traced my lips along her neck and jaw, moving my tongue softly along her flesh to her mouth. Lightly pressing my fingertips along all the bare skin I could feel, I hovered my lips just above hers, “I can wake up to this perfection every morning for the rest of my life, Grace.” 
Those two douchebags better not be still sleeping on the floor, because I’m not going to be able to stop this
.

Leaning my palms down on the bed on either side of her face, I brushed my tongue along her lower lip, then took it gently in between my teeth and nipped at it, savoring her exquisite taste. 
Who in this world doesn’t wake up with morning breath?  I never woke up with anybody next to me like this, ever, but seriously, she fucking tasted like honey, and I wanted to devour every fucking part of her.

She moved her body under me, a small rocking rhythm, which achingly rubbed her heat against my cock.  All I could do was nip at her skin harder and tightly fist the sheets into my hands.  “With a few exceptions,” she whispered against my lips.

“Like?” I asked in a low whisper.

“A hell of a lot less clothing,” she exhaled. 

The fuck if I cared who the hell was in this room with us. I had to fucking have her
.  “Grace…” I growled low, shifting myself on one elbow and pulling her knee up to wrap her leg around me.  Sliding my hands beneath the material of her pants, slowly to her silken thighs, pressing my fingers into her skin, I kissed her long, deep and hard.  It wasn’t slow and tender.  It was hot and frenzied and when she opened her mouth to me, I completely lost myself in her lips.