Ripped (Real Book 5)

Mackenna

“If you think I’m letting you ruin whatever deal you have with Leo, you’re wrong, Mackenna. I’m flying out of here, and I’m doing it alone.”

“Says who?” I contest, crossing my arms with a frown as I watch her pack. She’s got her suitcase up on the bed, and boy, is that lady on a mission to pack, and pack quickly.

“Says me!” she cries, then stops to look up at me with the same eyes that kill me in my dreams, every single night. “Please. If you’re worried—don’t be. I’ll be fine.”

“Yeah, but I won’t.”

She laughs and looks up from her suitcase as I approach. Now she’s blushing, and I like it. “Kenna.”

“I’m serious, I won’t. Be fine.”

Because truth be told, while she’s packing, I’m panicking. For real. I don’t want her to go, and I sure as fuck am not inclined to let her fly without me.

“Promise me you’ll stay here,” she says, clutching some sort of undergarment in her fist as she shoots me a warning glare. “You have a concert and I have . . . to go. Promise.”

I take the undergarment from her hand and fling it aside, squeezing both her hands in mine. “Pandora, I’m not letting her stop me from being with you again,” I tell her gruffly.

“Mackenna, this has to be a misunderstanding . . .” She trails off, then she’s up on her toes, taking my mouth, hard, leaving me winded. A hungry kiss. Like she’s fucking desperate for more.

When she turns to keep packing, I stop her and force her to face me, because all this? It’s eating me up. “She may deny it. Are you going to believe her over me?”

“She won’t deny it,” she whispers, dropping her gaze to my throat. “If it’s true.”

I drop my hands and a low, bitter laugh leaves me. Not lie about it? Yeah, right. That woman has been hell-bent on keeping us apart for years. It’s always been me. Never good enough for her—and even then, like the masochist pussy I am, I still fucking wanted her. “It is true. I won’t let her break us up, Pink,” I angrily warn.

“We’re not breaking up, we weren’t even back together!” she counters.

“Then let’s,” I insist.

“What?” she gasps.

“You heard me. Let’s officially get back together.”

I dig out my mother’s ring from the pocket of my jeans. I don’t care she threw it back at my feet. The fact that she’d kept it all these years tells me what she won’t tell me in words.

I saw her watching Brooke and Remington. I know she longs for that—craves it even—and I want to give it to her. Hell, I’ve been itching to get free of the crazy band hours, the fans, the paps, the cameras too. I want no one but this girl, but if I’m not good enough now, then fuck me, I’ll never be good enough for her.

“We can’t get back together,” she whisper-gasps, then plucks at some imaginary lint on her black T-shirt. “It’s not as if we can change anything, or pretend that we didn’t . . . fuck up.”

“True.” I reach around her and lower her suitcase lid so she stops packing for a hot sec and focuses on me. “But see, I don’t want to talk about the past right now, Pink. I want to talk about the future.”

She’s holding her breath.

“New York concert is in five days, right?” I press.

“Right.”

“So go home. Do what you need to do. But come back to me.” She stares at the ring I’m holding up, and I stare into those confused, dark coffee eyes. I’ve done this before, except six years ago, she was excited to see this ring.

Is this a promise ring?

What are you promising me?

Me.

But now she looks trapped. Sad. Lost. The tensing of her jaw indicates some deep frustration. My voice roughens with emotion because I don’t want her to be lost, I want her to feel certain, of me. I want her to find whatever she’s looking for, in me.

“I want you to come back, Pink,” I whisper, my voice husky as I hold her startled eyes with my own. “Not because they’re paying you to, but because you want to.”

“Kenna, what are you doing?”

He tips my head back. “In my life, there have been three times when I’ve had to make important choices.”

She can’t breathe.

And neither can I.

It’s been a long time since I’ve opened up like this to anyone. In fact, I can only remember opening up to one person like this in my life—and that person is standing right in front of me.

“The first time was when I left you. The second was when I joined the band. And the third,” I stare deeply at her, “the third one is right here, right now.”

“Kenna, this isn’t your choice. Me going home is my choice.”

“You’re right, but then I also have a choice here. You see, I choose”—I emphasize the word—“not to live without you anymore.”

She stares at me with those eyes that make my head spin, biting her lower lip in the way that makes my teeth ache.

There’s pain in her eyes.

Hell, I feel pain inside me.

But I can feel, deep in my gut, that she feels for me the same way I do for her. She’s just fighting it harder.

“I can’t do it so easily. I won’t leave my cousin, my friends, my life. I can’t! You don’t mean this.” She’s shaking her head frantically as if I’ve just proposed death instead of just the idea of being with me.

“You won’t have to leave your cousin, baby . . . I’m leaving the band.”

“What?” She’s stunned now—her suitcase, her packing forgotten as her mouth gapes wide. “But the band is a part of you.”

“So are you,” I point out cockily, then I lower my voice. “In fact, you’re the biggest, most important part of me.”

She stares at me like what I’ve just said is pure, raw torture. Like it’s hurting her, really hurting her. But I can’t let her go this time. I can’t walk away from her for the second time in my life. “Pink, I like writing my songs, and singing, but I want you more. I want to settle down . . . I want something normal. For once in my life, I want something normal.”

“I’m the furthest thing from normal, Kenna,” she chokes out with a bitter laugh.

“Well, you’re what I want. I want to give you normal.”

“Riding on a bike? In a Lamborghini? That’s not normal either,” she cries, and although her eyes are red and a little wet, she still fights to keep from letting those tears out.

Frustration starts knotting up my insides, and I grab her shoulders to give her a little shake. “Fuck, Pink. Are we going to fight about this? Huh?” I chuck her chin up. “All right, fine. I concede. You’re not normal. I’m not normal. But I want to give us our kind of normal—which might be weird and fucked up, but it works for us.”

“I . . .” She glances at me, then closes her eyes and whispers, “You’re tempting me in the worst way.”

I take her palm and set the ring inside, closing her fingers around the precious metal, the value of which means nothing compared to her, and then I stare into her face and wait. My heart’s a wild beast pounding in my rib cage. She’s stunning—all white skin with dark-painted lips, eyes like dark pools of night, glossy dark hair with its adorable pink streak. Her little breasts, her little ass, her long legs, and those long, pointy boots . . .

I like it all.

I want it all.

“But you still won’t say yes?” I press.

Say.

Yes.

Baby, say YES.

She won’t answer, so I drop my voice to its lowest tone—the one I use when singing ballads.

“Come because I ask you to, not because they pay you to. Come if you ever loved me. If you can ever love me. Come see me, Pink. Come hear me sing at Madison Square Garden.”

Her eyes soften with emotion, an emotion I can feel pooling in my gut.

“I thought you didn’t like knowing I was out there watching you sing.”

“That might be because I’d never had something I wanted you to hear me sing before,” I admit then brush a kiss, first to her forehead and then to the top of her ear. “If you do decide to come, let Lionel know. He’ll seat you.”

“I’m not sure it’s a good idea,” she hedges, but she’s got her fist closed tight around my ring. “You think I’ll show up, you’ll sing to me, and we’ll live happily ever after?”

“That’s what I’m going for.” I smile at her softly, torn between shaking her, begging her, and flat out ordering her to do as I say. “Fuck, Pink, just say you’ll come.”

“Say you’ll let me go home on my own. Your band needs you.”

I hesitate. She seems desperate to get rid of me right now. I’m not sure if she’ll come. But if she doesn’t . . .

Just go after her, dude.

“If I agree, you’ll come?” I say, trying to get something of an agreement out of her.

“Yes,” she says, looking at me and opening her palm as if she thinks I want the ring back. I close her fingers around it again.

“Keep this. It belonged to the first woman I loved, so it makes sense it should stay with the last.”

“Kenna!” she cries, but before she can make a thousand and one excuses as to why she can’t make it to my concert—excuses about why she still can’t open up—I head out of there, hoping that ring never finds its way back to me.

Like it did once before.