Page 25

“Oh my God.” A little moan fell from her mouth and her eyes fluttered closed. “That’s so good.”

She bit her lip.

Fuck. She shouldn’t do that.

“Harder” fell from her lips.

Blood surged through my body. My dick jolted. I laughed it off. The buzz from the alcohol must have kicked in. Straightening my leg along the outside of hers, I tucked my foot in beside her hip. “Is that okay? I need to stretch.”

“You want a massage too?” She smiled over the rim of her glass. “I’m not sure my hands are as magic as yours?”

I drove my thumb into her arch, and she moaned again. “Years of bass playing. I have strong fingers.”

Her fine eyebrow shot upward. “So you’re good at fingering things?”

I let out a low chuckle as I rubbed her toes and worked her instep. “Yeah. I can do this all day...and all night.”

“You want to prove that?”

“Uh...no.”

Giggling, she sank lower on the sofa. Her cell phone pinged. She grabbed it from beside her and scanned the screen. The glint in her eyes vanished.

“What’s up?” I eased off my rubbing.

“Um...It’s my ex, Rhett.” She spun her phone around and showed me a picture of him and some woman at a red-carpet event. “I still follow him on Instagram.”

“Rhett Newton was your ex? Lucky you. He’s hot.” He was one of the reasons why I loved her show. Something about buffed, sweaty firemen did it for me.

“Yep. He chased me and left his wife for me, then the second I got injured, he dumped me and went back to her.”

Damn. She’d done it again. Her tone was tough and flippant like nothing bothered her, but it held a bassline backloaded with heartache.

I circled my hand around her foot in a soothing rub. “Why are you still following him?”

“Self-sabotage. My daily dose of torture.”

I chuckled. Yep. I get that. “I’m with you. I followed my ex on Insta for ages too.” But I hadn’t looked at any of his posts for months. I’d moved on. Well...I was trying to.

She slapped my shin next to her. “Oh. What’s his name? I wanna see a picture.”

I took a deep breath to make sure my heart was in check. Nope. It wasn’t. Fuck. “Emilio Rivas.”

She typed on her screen, then her eyes lit up. “Oh my God. He’s gorgeous.”

The breath in my lungs ached. “Yes, he is.” He had thick black hair, golden skin, and hazel eyes, and a Brazilian body that just begged to be touched.

“How long ago did it end?”

I took a swig of bourbon and swallowed it, letting it burn the back of my throat. “Four months ago. We were together for five years.”

She dialed down her voice to just above a whisper. “Can I ask what happened?”

I stared into the fireplace, wishing it would incinerate my memories. “Um...I proposed. He turned me down.”

“YOU PROPOSED?” Her voice rebounded off the rafters. The whites of her eyes blazed bright. Her mouth hung open. “Holy shit.”

“Yeah. I’d thought everything between us was great. We were happy and in love. I’d bought a ring. I’d prepared a whole speech. I got down on one knee at our favorite Italian restaurant and he said no.” When he’d said he didn’t love me anymore, it had crushed my heart. When he’d said he’d tired of my volatile career, it had stabbed my stomach. When he’d moved to Miami without me, it had scarred my soul. I’d helped build his career, then he’d left. “Turns out, he loved himself and his DJing more than me. He moved to Florida the day after I proposed, and I haven’t heard from him since.”