Scars and Songs (58 page)

“God, it tastes like someone shit in my mouth last night,” Tucker moaned from the
floor. 
I.  Want.  To.  Cry
.  Tears stung at my eyes, my balls ached so damn bad, and my poor dick, it was never going to forgive me, never.

Reluctantly, I dragged my lips off her skin, both of us breathing heavily against each other.  “Oh God,” I moaned.  “Why are they still in here?”  I had to wipe away the stinging from my eyes.

Laughing, Grace pulled back the covers and sat up, moving away from me.  Shaking her head, she sat on the edge of the bed, swinging her feet.  I tried to grab at her hand, but the bottom half of my body refused to move. If it didn’t get relief soon it was going to cause a riot.

Then Alex’s dumbass head popped up from where he slept on the floor.  “If I don’t get coffee in me soon, I might kill someone,” he croaked.  “And Tuck, you taste like that because you’re such a fucking asshole.”  They were both looking at each other and didn’t seem to see Grace and me.

I sat up slowly, but man, it hurt like hell.

Tucker sat up next to Alex, “Where the fuck am I?”  He scanned the room and his eyes widened when he saw Grace, then almost popped fully out of their sockets when he noticed me.  “I slept on the fucking floor in Grace’s room?  And that douchebag slept in her bed?”

I was so not in the mood to hear his shit.  I practically growled and moved to slam my fists into his face, but Grace held her hand out to stop me. “Whoa.  Stop.  Alex?  Shane?  Please go make coffee. I need to speak to Tucker alone.  Again,” she sighed.

Tucker gave me a smug look, and then he mouthed to me, “She wants me.”  I narrowed my eyes at him then laughed.  Jackhat.  Alex laughed at Tucker too, walked over to me, and pulled me off the bed, patting him me on the back, “Let’s go, dude,” he said.

I had trouble walking.  Yep.

Alex pulled me into the hallway and shot me a serious look.  His eyebrows pulled together, hands planted heavily across his chest and his eyes scanned me up and down. 
What the hell?

He scratched at his chin, “Dude, you haven’t gotten laid in a long ass time, have you?”

“No,” I croaked.  “Haven’t wanted anybody else since I met Grace.”

Alex grabbed me, laugh
ed and yanked me into the bathroom, shoving me in.  “Dude, you’re having trouble walking.  Go take care of yourself before you poke someone’s eye out!”  Then he slammed the bathroom door in my face.  “I am impressed though,” he yelled on the other side of the door.  “But, don’t come out until you feed the monster!”

I actually stood there, staring at the door for a moment, not believing any of the shit that just happened.  Then I locked the damn door and went to it.  No, I’m not going to tell you exactly the way I jerked myself off in Grace’s bathroom. 
Twice
.  Why?  Because both times, it lasted not even two full seconds and it barely took the edge off.  I needed Grace.  I craved Grace.  And I was going to have her tonight,
no matter what
.  Besides that, I was going to find a way to tell her
everything
.  Fuck everything, I had to have faith in her that she’d accept me for who I was now. That had to be good enough for her, because that’s all I had to give her.

Leaving from Grace’s around three in the afternoon just about tore my heart in half.  I could tell by the way she stared down at her hands, and her dull monotone voice that she didn’t want me to leave,
but I needed to
.  I needed to see Michael before I told Grace anything, because the last thing I needed to do was throw myself off the great bridge of sin again and get myself punished for crap I didn’t do.

So with a dull ache in my chest, I waved goodbye to her and walked out the door.  The guys were right behind me. We really needed to make sure a cleaning service had been called for our place and Vixen4 was gone. But with one look from me, Ethan and Alex both shoved me away.  “Go do whatever it is you need to do, bro.  We got this,” Ethan said.

I stood in the middle of the sidewalk and watched them walk away, wondering where I could possibly go to get Michael’s attention.  Immediately, I turned on my heels and started for the subway, because I needed to get to lower Manhattan.

Twenty minutes later, I stood in front St. Paul’s Chapel in lower Manhattan.  Built back in 1764, it is the oldest church on the island, but that’s not the reason I went there. 

St. Paul's Chapel sits directly across the street from where the World Trade Center used to be. On that horrid September day back in 2001, the little church remained undamaged, despite the destruction and sheer terror that occurred just behind it.  It stood tall and defiant on that day, with its spire standing out in the dust, smoke and debris.  The epitome of hope in the middle of hell.

In all of Shane Maxton’s memories on this earth that I held, of all the places he’d ever visited, I had never been anywhere more moving than standing in front of that church.  Sorrow and grief was still evident in that place, and more than once, I had to wipe away silent tears that fell down my cheek. 

Michael stood in the small graveyard, overlooking the cold stones that spiked out of the hard earth beneath his feet.  He glanced at me once, but didn’t smile.  He held his breath for a few moments, and then puffed out a heavy sigh.  “This place is where you thought I would be?”

I shrugged and walked closer to him, standing shoulder to shoulder.  “Maybe it’s because I’m fully human…” I waved my arms around us.  “Tell me you can’t feel the hope in this place, the humanity, Michael.  I need you to see why I need to be with her, and why I’m choosing this.”

Michael stood still in expectation. He swallowed quickly squeezing his eyes closed, and lowering himself to his knees on the ground. 

I stood over him, “No matter how much hate was brought here, hope was born. 
That’s what humans do
.  For all that’s horrible and wrong here, Michael, they will always bring with them hope.  It fills me with awe, this feeling.  That’s what Grace holds, all this time.  All this time, Michael, hope is what kept her going.  Hope is what I have, that when I tell her I’m no longer an angel, she’ll settle for an ex-junkie with a heart full of scars, who has loved her since the beginning of time.  I’m telling her who I was.  I can’t be punished for the truth.  God is not hateful.”

I walked away slowly, leaving Michael leaning forward on his knees in the middle of
a graveyard, while hundreds of New Yorkers busily went about their day around us.  “No not hateful, Shane.  Just gone,” he called after me.

Chuckling, I turned around to look at the angel.  Holding my hands out around me, I spun in a slow circle, “No
, Michael, think more like a human.  He’s everywhere. 
You just don’t have faith in him anymore
.”

Michael’s posture suddenly stiffened, his muscles rigid and taunt, mouth falling open in an audible gasp.

“That’s right, Mikey, I just went
there
.”  Shoving my hands in my pockets and bouncing on my toes, I smiled at him, “And now, I’m going to go buy the biggest freaking diamond I can find in Manhattan, so everybody can see how much I love the girl who only wanted
me
for thousands of years.”

That’s exactly what I did.  Another subway ride to 57
th
Street and 5
th
Avenue; Tiffany’s. 

It only took me fifteen minutes to find the perfect ring to slide onto the hand of the only girl I’d ever loved.  For those of you that get off on that crap, it was
beyond fucking beautiful
.  A perfect brilliant center antique cushion cut 2.5-carat diamond wrapped in a delicate platinum design of smaller diamonds that sparkled like Grace’s eyes.  And yeah, I walked right out of the damn store with it, tucked deep in the pocket of my jacket. Now all I had to do was think of a way to ask her that would hold a special meaning to her.  Write it in roses?  A hot air balloon ride?  Sky writers?  Crap, I never thought I would have to think about this.  This was going to be the hard part.

The first show that Mad World was going to perform with Grace and Alex together,
and with me out of the slammer
, was at seven o’clock that night.  I was at Boozer’s by six, relaxing with a beer in my hand, ring in my pocket, and my heart crashing against my chest.

At ten minutes to seven, Grace walked through the front doors, flanked on both sides by Conner and Lea, who both wore worried expressions.  And Grace?  Grace was unnaturally pale, clutching her arms around herself tightly; body tense and rigid. 
What the hell was going on with her?
  I combed my fingers through my hair, my scalp prickling with an uneasy chill.  When her eyes met mine, an unshakeable sense of terror poured over me and I ran right to her.  Grabbing at her shoulders roughly, I lowered my eyes to hers frantically, “Grace, what’s wrong?  What happened?”

Her bottom lip quivered and her eyes pleaded with mine. “After the show, I’m going to have to leave for a while, Shane.”  She opened her mouth to say more but the words didn’t come. 

What?  No.  No fucking way
. 

“Is this about Gabriel?  Did something happen?  Or is this about me, Grace?”  I squeezed her shoulders, while searching her face for answers. 

She gave me none.

Then Ethan was behind her, lightly drumming his sticks on her shoulders,
and my freaking hands
. His eyebrows pulled together when he saw the terrified expression that lay across her face, “Hey, you okay?  We have five minutes to get to the stage, why you so late?”

Alex and Brayden jumped next to us then and excitedly pulled us to the stage.  They hadn’t noticed Grace’s unease or my worry.  She gave me a fake smile before climbing up onto the stage, “I’m fine, I just need a drink,” she blatantly lied. 

Ethan shoved two drinks at us, and she grabbed for hers as she yanked off her jacket.  I automatically sucked in a breath when I noticed the low cut shirt that clung to her body like pale pink paint, so damn fucking tight that her nipples pierced through the thin silky material.  She gulped back her shot, and I had to shake my head free of the desire to run my lips around her breasts so that I could dampen that silky material until her nipples could be seen through the wetness.

I quickly pressed her body behind one of the speakers, and lifted her chin to me.  “Babe, you need to tell me right now what’s going on.”  I could feel the tremble of her chin beneath my fingertips and my stomach felt like it bottomed out somewhere.  “Are you in trouble?  Is this about Gabriel?”  My chest ached and an angry heat flushed through my body. I moved closer to her, touching my body to hers.  “What the fuck is going on,” I growled.

She cringed with each word, then raised the palm of her hand against my cheek, “Shane, just sing with me, okay?  Just play that guitar of yours by my side tonight, the way that only you can.”  Her eyes were pleading with mine. 

I couldn’t end the discussion like this.  What the hell?  I grabbed at her waist but she slid out from behind the speakers and instantly captured the audience’s attention.  “
Grace, please
,” I called after her but the sounds of the crowd chanting our name drowned out my voice.  She pulled my guitar strap until I was out in front of the audience and the sound was deafening; it thundered and vibrated the stage under our feet.  She turned towards me and stared into my eyes and the tears that rimmed her lashes just about killed me.  Then after a deep breath, she gave me a slow sexy smile and leaned in closer to me, “Come on, Shane.  Play with me,” she whispered.

Somehow, my fingers found my strings and I played just for her.  My ghostly melody drifted slowly from my guitar. Alex joined me by twisting his fingers over his piano keys, creating the intro to one of our ballads.  The crowd quieted down, but it completely silenced with the first sounds of Grace’s haunting voice.  I looked out over the crowd of people, then back to her.  I watched her on stage next to me and I was completely captivated by her more than ever.  More than when we were in her father’s garden and I was just a blind faithless immortal. 

Grace fingers danced through the melody playing with a passion, telling her story and laying all her secrets in front of everyone.  Her body melted into her guitar; letting it know her intimately, becoming a part of her body and her soul.  I couldn’t take my eyes off her, and then she fucking sang my words and looked in my eyes.  And I was on my damn knees with my eyes locked on hers, listening to her haunting vocals.  Raw and powerful, stirring a reaction deep inside my heart where the darkness once ruled and hope seemed like a really bad joke.

My heart was pounding in time with Ethan’s beat, every inch of my skin tingled and I had no idea how I had ever thought I could be here without her.  My soul belonged to her, it always had.

The pain from you gone, is just too real

Burning so hot, it becomes numb

It’s a lie when they say time could heal

Am I too lost to be saved?

I’ve become as cold and hard stone

My eyes are opened to everything