Rhythm Of My Heart

Speed 3

by

Jess Dee

Dedication

To the ladies of International Heat, for being my 88 inches of therapy wrapped around me.

To Dawn, for all her awesome suggestions and help.

To Kitty Kelly and Fedora, for their never-ending support and insight.

And as always, to Jennifer, for holding my hand through this one, waiting patiently until I finally found the story and then improving it.

Chapter One

I have a song to sing with you,

Believe these words we know are true.

Feel it in the rhythm of your heart,

See the time your love will start.

She’s out there now, quietly waiting,

Red hair, green eyes…fascinating.

Appearances fool, you have been warned,

Follow your instinct, don’t be torn.

Edna Pace’s lullaby for Zachary

Zachary Pace rolled his shoulders, linked his fingers together, turned his palms outward and stretched his arms, flexing each muscle. With his eyes closed, he let the rhythm of the synthesizer flow through him, feeling the music all the way down to his toes.

He inhaled the summer Melbourne air as the cheers of the crowd seeped into his soul, then stepped onstage with his little brother, Seth.

The audience roared, shaking the wooden platform upon which they stood. Shrill screams pierced the late-afternoon sky and a pair of panties landed at his feet—alongside a ribbon-bound bunch of scarlet roses, a scatter of foil-covered chocolate hearts and a massive, printed marriage proposal.

Zachary grinned, pumped his fist in the air and became one with his alter ego, Jonah Speed.

This was where he belonged, where he thrived: on stage, before thousands of screaming fans. Every clap reverberated through his body. He ran across the platform to take a seat on his throne behind his drums.

Never had a term been more expressive, for when Jonah sat behind those drums, he became king. King of the Stage, King of Rock, King of Music.

He grabbed his sticks and struck his snare drum.

Game on.

His little brother twanged a note on his electric guitar, turned and grinned at Jonah, and in perfect synch, the two began to play “Thunder ’n Rain”, their current worldwide number-one hit.

If the crowd had exploded when he and Seth—better known to the public as Jordan Speed—walked on stage, it went insane now. The boom of Jonah’s bass drum shook the stadium but was almost drowned out by shouts of excitement.

The cries reached fever pitch as Nathan, Jonah’s older brother—or Jamie Speed—made his entrance. Jamie’s golden voice rang out pure and true, the magnificent timbre resonating across the arena.

Arms and hands rocked the air, the applause and yells became thunderous…and then…dropped—as they always did when the full impact of Jamie’s voice made itself known. As manic as the audience was, Jamie’s dulcet tones lulled them into mass ecstasy. A writhing mass of ecstasy, their facial expressions filled with awed bliss.

Jonah inhaled as he beat his drums and cymbals, setting the tempo of the song while blending in seamlessly with his fellow band members. The throb of his beloved instruments once again became the heartbeat of the music, the pulse of Speed.

The song ended and he began another, but not before Jamie seduced the crowd with words of welcome, encouraging them to belt out lyrics. The Melbourne audience needed no persuasion. With natural exuberance, they whooped, cheered, sang and danced with gusto.

Jonah let their infectious mania carry him from one song to the next, feeding the crowd’s desires, whipping them into a frenzy and rocking them into the evening. As the sun lowered in the sky, he lost himself to the magical atmosphere, to the yells and the screams and the music. To the invigorating Melbourne air. Sweat slid down his back, his muscles stretched and flexed, and adrenaline pumped through his blood, taking him on a trip more potent than any chemical-induced high.

His exhilaration only increased as a love-struck Jamie performed his solo, playing his piano and staring offstage at the woman who’d captured his heart so completely. The audience couldn’t see her, but Jonah could, and she looked as besotted with Jamie as he did with her.

Jonah set his sticks down and leaned back against his throne, breathing heavily, grateful for the short break. He glugged down a bottle of water. Like every other person in the stadium, he watched his brother, rapt. While Jamie’s hands flew over the keys of his baby grand, Nathan had eyes only for the blond-haired beauty. He seemed oblivious to the crowd.

Despite the heat throbbing through Jonah’s veins, Zachary’s heart twanged. That was what he wanted. A woman to enchant him, someone who’d capture his heart fully and not let go.

The woman his grandmother had assured him was his fate?

As Jamie’s ballad ended and the band picked up the pace, Jonah once again lost himself to the beat. For the next forty minutes he was one with the fans and the music, seamlessly transitioning from one song to the next. Both the audience and his heart pumped in time to the rhythm of his drums.

And when the concert wrapped up and they played their final encore, Jonah twirled his sticks and beat his cymbal for the last time that night. He walked across the stage to stand beside his brothers, bowing and waving. Sweat had his hair plastered to his face, and his T-shirt was drenched. Jamie and Jordan were just as wet.

The crowd didn’t care. It cheered louder and louder.

With a broad grin, Jonah bent over and picked up the marriage proposal and two red roses from the stage floor. The original bunch had long since been crushed beneath Jordan and Jamie’s feet, but hundreds more flowers had landed on stage during the concert.

He left the wrapped chocolate hearts and panties. Chocolates because they held no appeal and the panties because that particular kind of offering wasn’t always in pristine condition. While under the right circumstances, a worn pair of panties could be incredibly sexy, those thrown on stage by a stranger were…not.

He brought one of the roses to his mouth, kissed it and smiled at the audience. His name echoed through the night air, screamed by a chorus of hysterical feminine voices.

“We love you, Jonah!”

He loved them too. Every one of them.

And God, at times like this, he loved being Jonah Speed.

He dropped an arm around his little brother’s shoulders, and the two of them walked offstage, each accepting a towel to wipe down their sweat-dampened faces and heads.

Nathan already stood in the wings with Sophie all wrapped up in his arms.

Zachary handed the marriage proposal over to Luke Struthers, Speed’s band manager and his best buddy.

Luke accepted it with a smile and a shake of his head. “Another one?”

Zachary grinned back. “I’m the man. What can I say?”

Luke raised an eyebrow. “Yes?”

He laughed out loud. “To a marriage proposal from someone I’ve never met?”

“Maybe it’ll put an end to the self-imposed restrictions?”

Zachary winced. Yeah. Not ready to go there yet. Not ready to end those restrictions. He might not have been laid in six long months, but for now that suited him fine.

Except maybe for the adrenaline pumping through his body, making him horny as hell.

But he had a valid reason for his restrictions. One—or four—this-is-your-baby scandals had been enough to send Zachary’s gonads into hiding for a very long time.

Of course the accusations had proven to be complete bullshit. Still, they’d been a nasty wake-up call. Forced him to evaluate his life and his behavior. Forced him to see that the meaningless encounters and faceless fucks he’d grown so accustomed to were not what he wanted. And they were not making him happy.

Zachary wanted the real deal—the red-haired beauty he’d fantasized about since childhood.

Or if not her, at least a woman he cared about.

He was happy for Nathan, but that didn’t stop Zachary from eyeing him enviously. “I may be under restriction, but my big brother sure isn’t.”

“I might need a crowbar to pry those two apart,” Luke commented dryly, but his tone was indulgent.

Zachary let his gaze sweep over the people standing around. The entire backstage crew had paused to watch Jamie and Sophie, who were so enchanted with each other, they didn’t notice. Every one of them beamed, as though they found Nathan’s delight as infectious as Zachary and Luke did.

His gaze snagged on a particularly adorable smile. One made by cherry-red lips stretched wide across a lovely face.

Bam.

Lust hit him square in the chest.

His adrenaline rush hit an all-time high.

Okay, so maybe his gaze hadn’t been snagged by the smile. Maybe he’d subconsciously sought it out, just like he’d found himself doing since arriving in Sydney a week ago and meeting the Aussie crew.

Zachary didn’t know her name—yet. He’d made a conscious effort not to think about her, because thinking about her did those self-imposed restrictions no good whatsoever. What he did know was that each time he saw her he couldn’t look away. The sight of the tiny brunette packed a punch louder than the boom of a drum and more potent than the energy of the twenty thousand fans packed into the Rod Laver Arena.

If Zachary could have sat back down on his throne and hauled her with him, he would have. In a heartbeat. Would have stripped every last stitch of clothing from her lithe body, pulled her onto his lap and let her take them for the ride of their lives.

But that would hardly fit in with the revamped, sexually restrained Jonah Speed, now would it?

Something must have alerted her to his focused attention, because her gaze shifted, leaving Nathan and Sophie and landing firmly on him. Her lovely features reflected surprise, and after a couple of seconds, Zachary swore he saw a flicker of interest as well.

Satisfaction pooled deep in his stomach.

It had been a long while since he’d felt this level of attraction to anyone. A long time since he’d wanted a woman to consciously want him like he wanted her.

He’d grown altogether too used to the availability of a soft body whenever he desired one—or two. Groupies willing to offer whatever Zachary wanted. Sex with them had long since ceased to provide the satisfaction or the high it once had. Sex with them had long since stopped. Period. While he searched for something more meaningful, all they craved was a fix of the superstar, not the real man.

Zachary acted on impulse. “I’ll be right back.”

Luke answered, but Zachary didn’t register his words. He was too intent on his target.

Her cheeks pinked as he approached, and her chest rose and fell rapidly, but she watched every step, and her eyes filled with questions as he neared. Her scent filtered through his nose like a morning breeze, fresh and floral and arousing as hell.

She raised an eyebrow, highlighting blue eyes that resembled a spring sky—cloudless, with the promise of the heat to come.

Beautiful.

Her gaze held him rapt. Zachary couldn’t look away, didn’t want to look anywhere but at her.

The intensity of his stare must have made her uncomfortable, because after a moment she flinched uneasily. “Can I help you?”

Oh, yeah. She could help him…so long as she got them both naked in the next three seconds.

Restraint, Pace. Remember?

“Uh, are you okay?” she asked curiously.

Too busy devouring her stunning features with his gaze, Zachary didn’t answer.

She flinched again. “You’re looking at me as though…” The words stumbled and died. “Oh, shit.” Her mouth formed a perfect “O” and her eyes widened dramatically. “I have something on my face, don’t I?” She brushed at her cheeks. “Crumbs? Lipstick? Mascara on my chin?”

Bemused, Zachary shook his head. Her face was perfect. So was her Australian accent.

She frowned, then quickly clamped her mouth shut before opening it again, only this time her lips covered her teeth. “Somesing in my teef? A pieth of food?”

Again Zachary shook his head, incredulous that she could pull such a ridiculous face yet still look so pretty.

She breathed an audible sigh of relief.

“Okay. Then…what? Do you need makeup, maybe?” But she was already shaking her head as her gaze roved over his features. One look was enough to tell her makeup was not his thing.

“No.”

“Ah, he talks.”

Zachary grinned.

“Look, mate. You realize you’re freaking me out a bit here, just staring at me… Oh, Lord, are you okay? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“Not a ghost, no.” Although Zachary was struck by a strange sense of déjà vu. Something about her seemed so…familiar.

“Then what?” She held her hands up in question. “Are you going to explain why you’re looking at me like that?”

“You reminded me of my grandmother, for a minute there.” An image of Edna, his grandmother, flittered through his mind.

She frowned. “I’m twenty-five and I remind you of your grandmother? That cannot be a good thing.”

The chuckle he emitted was belly deep. “You reminded me about something she taught me,” he amended.

“Your nan taught you to stare at women until they squirm awkwardly on the spot?”

“No. She taught me to always appreciate the beauty in the world around me. And right now, I’m pretty damn sure I’m looking at the most beautiful part of Australia.”

Her jaw dropped. “P-pardon?”

Her accent made the word sound like puh-din.

“I’m looking at you, thinking you are, without a doubt, the most stunning part of Australia.” He hesitated just a second, then caught her delicate arm in his hand, aware of how large his fingers looked as they wrapped around her wrist.

He pressed the two roses into her palm. “For you. Beautiful flowers for a beautiful woman. Consider it my way of expressing my appreciation.”

Before a startled Eve Andrews had time to react to the drummer’s presence and unexpected gift, Jonah Speed turned around and headed back in the direction he’d come. He’d stared at her through his startling green eyes, called her beautiful, given her the flowers, blown her world clear off its axis and then walked away.

Just walked away.

What the…?

Eve blinked through her surprise and stared dumbfounded at the roses. She didn’t see them. All she saw were those eyes, so incredibly green they didn’t seem real. So incredibly arousing, she suspected she’d seen the promise of fulfillment of a million carnal fantasies in them.

Her heart beat jaggedly. Just as well he hadn’t hung around to chat further. Breathlessness rendered her incapable of speech.

Jonah Speed had just called her beautiful.

Her. Of all people. The irony was enough to inspire hysterical laughter. It bubbled in her chest, but she bit it back.

Photographs and movie clips did Jonah little justice. On paper and onscreen he was criminally sexy. In real life, drop-dead gorgeous didn’t adequately describe him. Heart-stopping, breathtaking, toe-curling, goose-bump-inducing…

Nope. Even those words weren’t powerful enough. They didn’t capture the essence of his blistering appeal.

His aura still held her frozen to the spot. Frozen, but heating up with every second that passed. And it wasn’t just the fact that he was Jonah Speed.

Speed’s drummer, Jonah Speed. The man Rolling Stone Magazine had described as a rock legend, drummer extraordinaire and lethal lady magnet.

Hands-down the sexiest rock star in the world, Jonah Speed.

No, it wasn’t his superstardom that had her awed. It was just him. His very presence.

She raised her eyes to watch him walk away. He had his back to her, and his damp T-shirt stretched taut across shoulders broader than a football field. Even from behind, he oozed sex appeal. It radiated off him in waves.

Her stomach curled in around itself, capturing millions of tiny butterflies fluttering wildly about within.

The crewmembers milling backstage stopped to watch Jonah approach his brothers and their band manager. More than one audible intake of air echoed through her ears as he walked by, confirming they too were struck by his tangible sexuality.

Eve’s heart raced like a hummingbird’s wings.

For long seconds she held the roses, stunned. These flowers had been tossed to Jonah by his rabid fans. From her view in the wings backstage, she’d seen the face of one woman who’d thrown roses, seen the star-struck adoration in her expression, the desperation to be noticed.

Could one of these roses be from her?

Eve was pretty sure when the roses were first offered to Jonah, they’d been fresher than they were now. Although still striking, the petals had wilted, their edges turning black. When she raised the flowers to her nose to sniff their delicate fragrance, she found none.

Her gaze returned to Jonah. He stood with the band, listening to whatever Luke Struthers was telling them. At regular intervals one or other of the Speed brothers nodded, commented or looked in the direction Luke pointed.

Goose bumps erupted over her skin.

Even in work mode, Jonah stood out. His presence made Eve want to tug at her shirt—yank it over her shoulders and present herself naked to the enthralling sex god.

Stunned by her impulses, she ran a calming hand gently over the left side of her face, from her forehead down to her neck.

It calmed her not at all.

Her interaction with Jonah had lasted a minute, maybe two, yet it had left her with an unexpected hunger.

A desperate, greedy need for more.

Shaking off temptation and grounding herself firmly in reality—the same reality where she was just a regular person and she hadn’t been given half-dead roses by Jonah Speed—she turned back to the table behind her and finished packing her portable makeup box with trembling hands.

Over the years, Eve had assembled an inspiring collection of makeup. A collection that caused raptures in Delilah and Devine, Speed’s gorgeous yet surprisingly down-to-earth back-up singers. The two of them had contacted her three months ago, inviting her to join them for the six-month duration of the Speed worldwide concert tour.

Hard work, determination and a fierce belief in her ability had helped Eve to make a name for herself as a makeup artist in the Australian TV and film industry, but she’d had no idea her reputation had crossed oceans. The thought that she was now officially on tour with Speed still flabbergasted her.

Who would have thought the scarred, traumatized girl who grew up in Tamworth would be part of the entertainment event of the decade?

She popped the last eyeliner back in its slot and tucked a lipstick in a side pocket before snapping the box shut. Silently giving thanks to the inventor of the wheel, she pulled up the handle, propped the heavy, jam-packed case at an angle and set off, heading to the tunnel leading to the inside of the arena, pulling the case behind her.

She made sure not to leave the roses behind. Oh no, she had plans for the two secondhand, wilting blossoms Jonah Speed had given her.

The opportunity to put that plan into action presented itself not a minute later as the sound of deep male laughter echoed through the air behind her.

Hot chills ran up her spine, heating her skin and making her shiver at the same time. Stopping midstep, she turned around, forcing the two men and a woman walking behind her to either stop suddenly themselves or collide with her.

One man stopped dead, the other two effortlessly sidestepped her.

Eve caught a whiff of Jordan Speed’s aftershave as he walked by still chuckling, his arm slung casually around the woman’s shoulders. “See you on the other side,” he called to his brother, and they continued on their way.

She tried to still her insanely beating heart. Honestly she did. If she was going to spend the next six months on tour with the band, she couldn’t break out in fan-girl spasms every time one of the brothers came within a three-mile radius.

But Jordan Speed had just walked past her. Jordan Speed, for heaven’s sake!

How on earth could she still her crazy heart and shaking hands in the presence of Jordan and Jonah Speed?

Although Jordan and the woman were already gone, leaving her face-to-face, once again, with the middle Speed brother.

The laughter that had boomed from his chest seconds ago died, and the smile that had lit his face, temporarily blinding her with its brilliance, straightened as he regarded her with those smoldering green eyes.

God! This man screamed sex. Blatant, raw sex. The kind of sex that should be outlawed.

He fogged her ability to think rationally.

Eve’s shirt pulled tight across her breasts, irksome and uncomfortable. Again the urge to remove it—and her bra—skittered across her arms.

She rounded her shoulders, refusing to let his innate sensuality interfere with her plan. She didn’t care how famous—or gorgeous—Jonah was, her clothes would stay firmly in place.

“I’d hoped to run into you again tonight.” Wow, was that her voice? It sounded surprisingly steady, seeing as her lungs weren’t functioning at full capacity.

“Beautiful, you can run into me anytime, day or night.” His reply was spoken through luscious, full and tantalizing lips.

She didn’t want to run, she wanted to crash into him at full speed.

Pardon the pun.

“Look, while I’m hugely complimented that you’d want to give me flowers, and while I thank you for thinking I’m…beautiful—” She tripped over the word. It wasn’t one she associated with herself. It wasn’t one anyone associated with her. “I just can’t accept these.” She held the roses out to Jonah.

Surely it was both criminal and unjust for a man to look this good? Smell so good? Sound so good…

Jonah looked at her, baffled. “You’re giving them back to me?”

“I am.” She tried to ignore the fact that his voice was as intoxicating as the rest of him. It was deep and velvety, like a gentle vibration from a bass drum.

Instead of accepting the flowers, Jonah folded his arms across his chest.

The movement drew her gaze to that beautifully sculpted chest. And to the tanned arms and outrageously broad shoulders. His shirt was plastered to his skin, outlining the exquisite muscle definition beneath.

Eve struggled to draw breath. Since when had sweaty men turned her on?

Since never, that’s when, yet one look at Jonah’s shoulders, at the way that shirt hugged them, the way his damp hair curled around his face, and funny things happened in places she shouldn’t be thinking about now.

“Why?”

“Because as well-intentioned and as lovely as your gesture was, somehow secondhand roses fail to make me feel beautiful.”

“Secondhand?” Jonah looked startled, taken aback even, but then his confidence seemed to bounce right back into place. “You think I gave you used flowers?” The smile that lifted the corner of his mouth was slow in coming, but once it was there…boy, it stopped her lungs altogether for a good few seconds.

“Those flowers were tossed onstage for you. Not me.”

“Which made them my flowers. Is it a crime to give away something that belongs to me?”

“Not a crime. No. And as I said, your intentions were thoughtful and complimentary. But those roses…they were meant for you. They were given to you.”

His response perplexed her. First he raised an eyebrow in surprise, then he gave a confused shake of his head and finally he stuck out his hand, not to take the roses but in introduction. “We haven’t had the pleasure of meeting yet. I’m Jonah Speed.”

She eyed his palm warily as her fingers feathered once again over her left cheek, a nervous habit she wished she could break but knew she never would.

There was no way Jonah could know it, but a handshake was something Eve avoided whenever possible. Instinct, and a slight tingle in her palm, told her this shake would reveal more about Jonah than he’d be willing to share.

Besides, she didn’t want to shake Jonah’s hand, she wanted to clutch it and press it to her breast. And her ass. And her…

Behave.

“It’s nice to meet you, Jonah.” Instead of shaking his extended hand, she placed the roses into it, making good and sure she didn’t touch his skin in the process. She strongly suspected if her hand so much as grazed his she’d be forced to grab great big handfuls of the man, see whatever she was meant to see and never let go again.

His fingers wrapped around the stems and he looked at them curiously, as though not sure how to respond. Then he dipped his head in acceptance and pulled his arm back. “You’re right. It never occurred to me that you’d view these flowers as secondhand, or that I was giving away something meant expressly for me. My apologies. It must seem incredibly rude.”

He sounded both surprised and sincere, making Eve wonder if anyone had ever rejected a gift from Jonah Speed before her.

Her smile was as gentle and forgiving as her tone. “No apologies necessary. It was a lovely gesture.” She tried. God help her, she tried, but she just couldn’t help herself. Eve had to touch him. She grazed her hand gently over his biceps, just below the edge of his sleeve, so she met bare skin. Sparks shot through her hand straight up her arm.

With that, and before she did something stupid—like rip off that irksome top of hers and jump him—she turned back around and, tugging her makeup case behind her, continued down the tunnel until she entered the arena and dressing rooms.

She felt Jonah’s gaze on her back the entire way. It drilled into her like a million sharp darts of awareness.

Eve was only too relieved to shut herself in Delilah and Devine’s change room. Her heart pounded, a million beats a minute for sure. Jonah’s drums probably couldn’t hammer louder.

Never had anyone affected her so. Never had she desperately wanted to shove herself in a man’s embrace like she did with Jonah. Put herself at his mercy and beg him to do anything and everything to her body. He’d handed her half-dead, used roses, and all she could think now was how damn much she wanted to sleep with him.

No. Not sleep. Fuck him—all the way through the night and long into the next morning.

But then, who didn’t want to fuck him? He was Jonah Speed—rock legend, drummer extraordinaire and lethal to women.

Eve breathed deeply, calming herself while she waited for Delilah and Devine to shower before she fixed their hair and makeup, preparing them for the after party.

It was well past midnight by the time the crew arrived back at the hotel. Too tired to even contemplate a party—the third one in less than a week—no matter how much the back-up singers insisted she join them, and perhaps too scared to contemplate coming face to face with Jonah again, she ignored the party suite—jam-packed and writhing with people—and made her way to her own room.

The first thing that caught her eye as she opened the door was a massive bouquet of stunning blood-red roses, centered on the small table beneath the window. There must have been fifty long-stemmed flowers in the glass vase, each one fresher and more dazzling than the next. Their fragrance filled the room, making Eve dizzy.

She threw her key card and bag on the bed, set her makeup kit against the wall and trudged over to read the card attached.

Not secondhand, I promise.

These are meant only for you.

J

Chapter Two

With his customary bottle of beer in hand, Zachary slipped through the crowded suite, searching for Luke. He had to thank the guy for cutting short the interview he’d just been subjected to. Although the TV anchorwoman had behaved like the ultimate professional, her cameraman had openly propositioned him, painting an explicit picture of what Zachary could do to him and the interviewer, given the opportunity.

He shuddered. His days of sex for the sake of sex were over.

Been there, done that, got the T-shirt.

T-shirts, he amended silently. Zachary had collected a sickening number of them, each one representative of his various degrees of debauchery. If it was doable, he’d done it, and the memories did not always make him proud.

Zachary never found Luke. Instead he was waylaid by a group of teenage girls. With their long hair, skinny jeans, skimpy shirts and impossibly high heels, they all looked the same. Zachary had long since stopped trying to differentiate one face from another. He’d become too accustomed to the clusters of females who swarmed him.

Not groupies. No, groupies were another kettle of fish. A kettle that shared most of his been-there-done-that T-shirts.

These were fans. Adoring girls who’d be content with a smile or an autograph or a high-five.

At first, when fame had struck so fast, he’d tried to talk to them all, tried to offer them each a real smile and a heartfelt word. But that had soon become impossible. When hundreds, sometimes thousands, of fans flocked to him, it was unfeasible to give each of them his individual attention.

He’d since mastered the art of singling out one admirer while tackling some of the hundreds of questions that were tossed his way.

Zachary smiled patiently and handled the girls. As he spoke, he eyed the quietest one, a plain redhead. Yeah, so sue him. He had a soft spot for redheads. Especially redheads with green eyes. This one was shyer than the rest of her friends and not trying to get his attention. Instead she seemed content to stand aside while her companions flirted shamelessly.

He grinned at her and almost laughed at her responding look of bewilderment. As a black marker was handed to him and he signed his name to someone’s shirt, he winked at the redhead.

Her eyes widened and her cheeks turned pink. She smiled back.

Zachary answered questions as he always did—mostly with non-answers or by deflecting the questions back to the girls.

“Do you have a girlfriend, Jonah?”

“A pretty girl like you asking me that?” Said with a winning smile. “I bet you’re trying to make your boyfriend jealous.”

“What’s your star sign, Jonah?”

“Well, now, I’m guessing you must be a Libra.” Libra. The first star sign he could think of. “It’s funny, you know. Libras ask that question a lot.”

And so the conversation went, with Zachary charming the young women and signing his name at least five more times. The girls grew bolder, and by the time he penned his last autograph, it was to bare flesh, just above firm breasts.

He refused to sign the bare breasts themselves. The girls were just too young for that to sit comfortably with him.

He would have stayed with them longer had an impulse to raise his gaze and look across the room not caught him by surprise.

Bam.

Desire hit him like a punch in the gut.

There she was, leaning against the wall, chatting to Delilah but watching him speculatively. Again that sense of familiarity wafted through his mind. He’d never met her before this tour, but something about her yanked at a string in his memory.

He answered his last question and held his palm out to the shy redhead. When she tentatively gave him her hand, he lifted it to his mouth and kissed her fingers, leaving the girl flushed and her friends oohing and aahing.

With a final smile in her direction, he extricated himself from the group and walked directly to the woman whose gaze still followed his movements. In her hand she held a single rose in full bloom. Delilah no longer stood with her.

She was an enigma, for sure.

Apart from his mother, Zachary hadn’t given anyone flowers in a long time. Yet tonight, when instinct had dictated he offer this woman roses, she’d rejected them. Rejected him, cold. Hadn’t even bothered to tell him her name.

Eve Andrews.

Zachary couldn’t remember the last time he’d been rejected. Hell, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d made the first move. Continually surrounded by groupies and fans, anything more than a meaningful look or raised eyebrow had become obsolete.

He handed his half-empty beer bottle to a waiter, neatly sidestepped a woman who eyed him lecherously, smiled for a press photographer and finally reached his destination.

She leaned quietly against the wall, her arms crossed over her chest, the single rose resting across her breasts. Breasts that looked pert and appealing beneath the tight, black T-shirt she wore. The shirt ended just above her hips, an inch or two short of her white jeans, offering Zachary an enticing view of pale female flesh.

Unlike him, she hadn’t changed since the concert. But even at this hour—well past one in the morning—she looked fresh and vital, as though she’d just stepped out of the shower.

He wondered how she’d react if he buried his nose in the crook of her neck and breathed deeply of her scent.

Probably not too kindly.

Zachary had a sudden, overwhelming urge to impress her. To say something that would blow her mind and replace the caution in her eyes with undimmed interest. He waited a heartbeat for the right words to come and then smiled at her.

“Hey.”

Hey? Seriously?

“Hey.” She bit her lower lip.

“How are you?”

Really, Zachary? That’s the best you’ve got?

“Good. You?”

“Good. Enjoying the party?”

Ah, fuck. Shoot me now. Could he say anything more mundane? If Luke and his brothers had heard him, they’d be doubled over with laughter.

She raised a dainty shoulder. “It’s all right.”

“Just all right?” Her answer made him smile. He knew the lengths people went to in order to get an invitation to these parties, yet Eve was totally blasé about it.

“I hadn’t intended to come. I was just going to go to sleep.”

Zachary angled himself in front of her, intentionally giving the rest of the world his back. Right now he was interested in no one but the beguiling woman before him. “What changed your mind?”

And could he just add, silently, that he was mighty glad she had changed her mind?

She raised the rose, offering it to him. “This did.”

He made a mental note to thank Luke. Who else could organize a delivery of fresh flowers—while coordinating the usual post-concert chaos—in a strange city, at midnight?

Zachary lifted it to his nose and inhaled. Sweet, but not nearly as sweet as Eve. “You’re giving me a used rose?”

“Ah, I’m not giving it to you. As soon as I leave, I’m taking it back. I just thought you might want to see what I’m thanking you for.” She ran a hand over her left cheek. “The flowers are beautiful. Every one of them. Thank you.”

Zachary drank in the sight of her. She was tiny. If he pulled her into his arms—which yes, he wanted to do, badly—her forehead head would press against his sternum. That wasn’t a bad thing. Not at all. Her long brown hair would feather across his chest and nipples. And if she wrapped her legs around him while he drove into her, over and over again, he doubted she’d be able to cross her feet behind his back.

The image was enough to stir his cock to life.

She was also incredibly pretty. The longer he drank in the sight of her, the prettier she looked, and the harder he became. Her makeup was perfect, the tones of her blush making her sky-blue eyes seem bluer and her cherry-red lips supremely kissable.

Given the opportunity, he’d press his mouth to hers and discover if her lips tasted as good as they looked.

It was lucky for Eve the rush of adrenaline from the concert had eased, otherwise Zachary wasn’t sure he’d have been able to stop himself from kissing her. From pressing her against the wall, pressing himself to her and ravaging her lips—and pussy.

Even now, his control was questionable.

“You’re very welcome. I’m sorry if I insulted you earlier, giving you flowers that were meant for me.”

She eyed him in silence for a good few seconds before letting him off the hook. “No harm done.”

“How about we start again? From the beginning this time.” He stuck out his hand. “I’m Z…” Oops. “Jonah Speed.” Jesus, she had his brain all fried.

She batted his arm away. “There’s no need for such formalities. I know who you are.” Her laughter filled the air, a soft tinkle like a stream trickling over rocks. “The whole world knows who you are.”

Perhaps the whole world knew who Jonah Speed was, but Zachary Pace was another deal altogether. And right now Zachary Pace had an overwhelming need to get to know this woman better.

He narrowed his eyes. “That’s the second time you’ve evaded my introduction. I’m beginning to think you’re determined to never tell me your name.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Fifty long-stemmed red roses mysteriously made their way into my hotel room at midnight. I have more than a sneaking suspicion that you already know my name.”

Zachary bit back his grin and drew his features into an embarrassed expression. “So you heard me, then, after the concert?”

“Heard you…?”

“Asking, yelling really, for someone, anyone, to please tell me your name when you walked away from me.”

“Er, no.”

“I begged who’d ever listen. Maybe even tried to bribe a couple of the lights guys.”

The edges of her mouth twitched. “You did not.”

“Did too. Even groveled at the feet of a complete stranger.”

“Did she answer you?”

“He. And no. But he did look at me as though I were a pitiful mutt.”

Her eyes danced with amusement. “So how did you find out?”

“What makes you think I did?”

She looked pointedly at the rose.

“Okay, guilty. I know it.”

“How?”

“Delilah. She took pity on me.” He frowned. “And by took pity, I mean she kicked me, hard, when I wrapped myself around her leg and refused to let go until I knew your name. She poked me in the eye and demanded I stop humiliating myself in public.”

She laughed in delight. “Well, now I know for sure you’re talking nonsense. Both Delilah and Devine were already in their change room when I got there.”

He winked and finally shared the truth. “Luke told me.”

She looked surprised. “Luke knows my name?”

“Luke probably knows your date of birth, address and social security number too. He’s that organized.”

“I’m Australian. I don’t have a social security number.”

“Your phone number then,” he amended.

“That I have.”

“May I have it?”

“What?”

“Your phone number.”

She looked baffled. “Why would you need it?”

“Oh, I don’t know. To phone you, maybe?”

“But I’m touring with you. There’s no need to phone me. Now that you know it, you can just call my name, and I’ll respond.”

“Eve.” He liked the way it sounded, rolling over his lips.

“That’s me.”

“You’re the first person I’ve given flowers to in a very long time.”

Again she looked surprised. “Well, in that case, Jonah, I’m honored.”

He smiled. He liked the way she said Jonah, but couldn’t help wondering how Zachary would sound coming from those cherry-red lips. “Would you like a drink?”

“No, thank you.”

“Something to eat?”

“I’m good.”

She looked good. Good enough to eat.

“Would you come with me then, to get some food?”

Eve gnawed on her lower lip. Her eyes filled with trepidation. “Why me, Jonah?”

“Why would I like you to come and get food with me?”

“No. Why did you choose to send flowers to me, of all people?”

“You don’t like flowers?”

“I love them. Especially fresh ones meant for me.” She smiled shyly. “But that doesn’t answer my question. Why did you choose to give me flowers when you haven’t given them to anyone else in ages?”

“You really need to ask?”

“Mate, you’re Jonah Speed. I’m…well, I’m just me. A scarred girl living in Sydney. It makes no sense.”

Did she say scarred or scared? It was tough to tell with her accent. And why would she be either? “You’re…scarred?”

She waved his question away. “Uh-uh. No getting sidetracked. You’re evading the issue. Why me?”

“Why do you think a man would give a beautiful woman flowers?”

She huffed out a breath. “Do you answer all questions with more questions, or just mine?”

For the second time since meeting her, Jonah found himself apologizing. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize I was. Do I really do that?”

She glared at him for asking another question, and he grinned in response.

“So?” she pushed. “Why me?”

Apparently she really did need to ask. “Because once I laid eyes on you, it was difficult to look away. But when you caught me staring, I couldn’t just keep ogling you. That would have been creepy. So I gave you the flowers.” He snorted with humor. “Thought it would be a good idea at the time.”

“The roses in my room were a good idea. A really good idea.”

Zachary’s stomach chose that moment to growl. “Are roses edible?”

“Uh…” She wrinkled her nose. “I have no idea. Why?”

“Because if you don’t come with me to find some food now, I may have to eat this damn flower.”

She grabbed it back from him. “No way, mate. If you’re hungry, go get food. Leave my rose alone.”

“Come with me?”

“You can’t find the buffet table alone?”

“It’s not that I can’t find it. It’s that I’ll never reach it alone.”

She raised an eyebrow.

“There’s a woman on your right, about ten feet away, who’s eyeing me like I’m breakfast, a reporter behind me who wants to get me alone for an exclusive Jonah Speed interview, a sex-starved cameraman by the bar, and three women who’ve been giving you the evil eye ever since I walked over here.”

“You picked up on all this while talking to me?”

Zachary shrugged. “I’ve learned to become aware of the people around me.”

“And my accompanying you to the buffet table will help you how?”

“People tend to give me more space if I’m not alone.”

“Ah. So you want me for security.”

He eyed her petite form. “Yeah, Tiny. One ominous glare from you, and you’ll send the crowds packing.”

“Tiny?”

He shrugged. “Hey, if the name fits…”

“That’s the best you could come up with?”

“Well, short-shit came to mind, but I figured you’d like that as much as you like secondhand roses.”

“Uh, yeah. You figured right.”

“So Tiny it is.”

She pointed a thumb at her chest. “I might be short, but I bet I could eat you under the table.”

“I thought the expression was ‘drink you under the table’?”

“I don’t drink.”

“You don’t?”

“I don’t. Now let’s get you some food before you pass out. Or worse, attack my flower.”

Zachary didn’t budge, but he did give her his best smile. “I’d like to see you eat me under the table.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Am I picking up on hidden innuendo, Mr. Speed?”

Bam.

There it was again. The jolt of lust that smacked him in the chest.

“No, Tiny. When you eat me, we won’t be anywhere near a table.”

“When?” This time she snorted, as if the idea were hilarious.

“Hey, a man can always hope.” Damn, knocked back again. Eve Andrews was not good for his ego. Not good at all. Yet Zachary couldn’t deny he was enjoying her company immensely.

“Hope for a dessert table then,” Eve said. “I need sugar. Do you think there’s chocolate mousse?”

Zachary curled his upper lip. “God, I hope not.” He placed his hand on her shoulder and urged her towards the other side of the room, where the food had been set out.

“You don’t like chocolate mousse?” She looked horrified.

He let his hand drift down until it rested on her lower back. He left it there, liking how she felt, liking how the rise of her ass pressed against his palm. He’d like to press his lips to it too. And his cock. “I don’t like chocolate, period.”

“What? How can anyone not like chocolate?”

“It’s too sweet and too rich. Plus it gets stuck on the roof of your mouth, and the only way to wash it away is with a good swallow of beer.”

She shook her head in disbelief. “At least now I understand why you think I’m beautiful. Your taste sucks great big dingo balls.”

His jaw dropped. “My taste what?”

“Sucks. You have poor taste in food and drink. It’s obvious.”

“Dingo balls?”

“It’s an expression.”

“Strange expression.”

“Strange taste.”

“Good taste,” he amended. “And you are beautiful.”

“Chocolate’s beautiful. Here, I’ll prove it.” They’d reached the table, and Eve made a beeline for the assortment of desserts. She scanned the plates and helped herself to a saucer, which she loaded with chocolate truffles. “No mousse,” she said, regret evident in her tone. “But open up and try one of these.” She held a chocolate truffle to his mouth.

“Tempted as I am…no thanks.” The temptation had nothing to do with the candy, and everything to do with the hand it rested in.

“You’re not even going to try it?”

“Not even.”

“But…but it’s delicious.”

“So you eat it.”

“You won’t have even a bite?”

“Not even a nibble.” Unless it had all melted on her fingers, and then he doubted he’d stop at a nibble.

“You’re nuts.”

“I eat nuts, just not chocolate.”

She narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “I suspect you may not be fully human.”

He half suspected she was right, especially considering the animalistic way his body responded to her presence. She had him starved for a taste…of Eve. The chocolate may not appeal, but he could tuck into her with zest. “I suspect that chocolate is about to disappear into your mouth.”

“I suspect you’re right.” Her eyes twinkled and she popped the chocolate between her lips.

She didn’t chew it. Not immediately. Rather she left it in her mouth. To melt?

Zachary had no idea. All he knew was now that the candy was in her mouth, he couldn’t avert his gaze.

Again he stared at her, bewitched.

Her eyes closed and she let out a soft moan of pleasure.

“Good?”

Eve’s “Mmmmm” reverberated down his spine and echoed in his groin.

How the fuck could eating chocolate turn into the most erotic encounter on earth? Eve made it look like she was lost in the throes of spectacular sex. The woman had a chocolate in her mouth, that was all. Yet the bliss on her face and satisfaction in her soft moan had Zachary hardening to the point of pain.

Christ, he hoped no one noticed.

She chewed, her red lips a beacon to his gaze.

He wanted to kiss her, wanted to mold his mouth to hers and taste the pleasure on her breath.

Yeah. Not going to happen. Not here, in a room packed full of curious eyes and cameras.

“If you carry on chewing like that—” Zachary’s voice was a low growl, “—like you’re about to have an orgasm, I am going to throw you under the table and eat every last bit of you.”

Eve’s eyes popped open, and she swallowed quickly. “You know it would be way simpler if you just ate the truffle?”

“Maybe. But it wouldn’t taste half as good.”

“You know what you are, Jonah Speed?”

Aroused? Frustrated? Horny? “What am I, Eve Andrews?”

“A first-rate, grade-A flirt.” She lifted a second truffle to her mouth and licked it. Those cherry-red lips of hers framed the milk chocolate, and her tongue was just visible, dabbing at the treat.

The roomful of curious eyes and cameras faded to insignificance. Sound faded too. The chocolate and Eve’s lips were his sole focus. His sole desire.

With one hand, he plucked the saucer from her hand and set it on the table. With the other he plucked her hand from her mouth and tossed the half-eaten chocolate over his shoulder.

Before she had a chance to object—and by the look in her eyes she intended to object, vehemently—he yanked her against him, bent his head and kissed her.

Just claimed her mouth with his, taking advantage of her surprised gasp to slip his tongue between those cherry-red lips and sample the chocolate she’d just licked.

Jesus, fuck. She was right. The chocolate wasn’t just good. It was delectable. Mouthwatering. It blew his mind. And he hated chocolate.

Eve sagged in his arms, as though she’d turned boneless. He hauled her closer, molding her to his body, squashing the rose between them. Her soft curves pressed tight against his firmer bulk. She clutched at him with one hand, grabbing his arm, squeezing it, then slowly letting her hand skim up over his shoulder until she buried it in his hair.

Her tongue drifted over his, toyed with it. Tasted him like he tasted her. And damned if it wasn’t the sweetest, hottest kiss Zachary had ever shared.

He kissed her harder, lost himself to the creamy, rich flavor of Eve and chocolate.

The chocolate had nothing on the woman. Couldn’t compete with her.

Lights flared against his eyes. Once, twice, a million times. Fireworks? From a kiss? That was a first. Not surprising though, not with the way his body reacted to the kiss, but a first.

Fu-uck.

Sanity returned like a sharp slap.

Those bursts of light weren’t fireworks at all. Not even close. They were flashes. Camera flashes. Tons of them.

Zachary broke the kiss with a silent, foul curse and stepped back, holding Eve’s arms to steady her.

Jesus, how stupid could he have been?

She blinked once, then again, scrunching her eyes against the flares of light, looking bewildered at first and then just a little terrified.

“Hell! I’m sorry.” He whispered the apology as he scanned the room. Luke would sort this out instantly, leaving Zachary free to slip away with Eve. “I wasn’t thinking.”

No, he definitely wasn’t. All rational thought had fled his mind as she’d devoured those chocolates.

Shit. Shit, shit, shit.

The band manager was nowhere to be seen, which meant it was up to Zachary to initiate damage control. Problem was, hundreds of people had caught him and Eve lip-locked on camera. There was very little he could do about it.

Even now flashes continued, and mobile phones were more visible than faces. Every Tom, Dick and photographer had caught Zachary’s impulsive behavior on film.

It was just a matter of time before those photos appeared on the net, in newspapers, on TV and in every gossip rag around the world.

The only good thing about this whole mess was that Zachary’s erection had died a hasty death beneath the flashes of light.

Fuck. How stupid was he? How careless?

In the three years since Speed had soared to fame, he’d never acted so impulsively, so thoughtlessly. But then he’d never had cause. Never met anyone like Eve before. Never wanted to kiss a woman at the expense of his reputation and hers.

Zachary might be used to the lights and fame. He might be used to the paparazzi dogging his every move, but he doubted Eve was. And he was furious at himself for putting her in this position. He knew exactly what the pap was capable of, and he hated them for it.

Knowing there was no alternative but to acknowledge the attention, Zachary lifted his arm in a silent salute and waved.

“Yeah, yeah. I know. You got me.” He smiled, shamefaced, at the crowd around him. He should be shamefaced, putting the two of them in this position.

Then he tucked a shell-shocked Eve under his arm and led her through the room, winding around the thicket of bodies pressing toward them and shaking his head at requests for more photos.

“You didn’t get enough already?” he joked with a grin he in no way felt.

“Is she your girlfriend, Jonah?”

“Another one-night stand, or the real thing?”

“What’s her name?”

“Forget her, Jonah. Take me.”

“Take us both.”

The questions and comments kept flying, and Eve gulped noisily at his side.

“Almost to the door,” he murmured, urging her to keep walking.

“If you ever kiss me again,” Eve griped, “I will poke you in the eye, never mind Delilah.”

“Ouch,” was his first whispered response, and “It’ll be worth it,” his next.

“Both eyes then.”

They reached the door, and Zachary hurried her out. He shot a meaningful look at one of the bodyguards Luke had organized for the tour.

The man needed no further instruction. As Zachary grabbed Eve’s hand and raced down the hall, two guards placed themselves in the doorway, effectively stopping anyone from following.

They’d barely slipped around the first corner when Eve came to a dead halt.

A soft groan escaped her throat, and her eyes flickered closed.

Chapter Three

“Eve? Tiny? Can you hear me?”

She could. His voice echoed in the periphery of her mind, but she couldn’t focus on it, couldn’t respond. Her vision darkened and spots danced before her eyes.

Darts of heat ran up her arm, originating from the sharp tingles in her hand.

“Christ, you’re pale as a ghost.”

“Sing it, Grandmother, sing it again.”

There were two voices now. One she recognized, one she didn’t. The first was Jonah’s, the second a child’s.

Someone laughed. A woman. “Okay then, Zachary, but this is the last time and then you need to go to sleep. Agreed?”

“Agreed.”

Eve tried to gain perspective, tried to force herself back into the present. But it was too late. Jonah held her hand. And the tingles had increased so now it felt like electricity pulsing through her arm.

And then Eve wasn’t Eve anymore.

She was Zachary, the child sitting cross-legged on his bed, listening, rapt, to his grandmother sing.

I have a song to sing with you,

Believe these words we know are true.

He loved the song. Loved the images it inspired every time his grandmother sang it.

Feel it in the rhythm of your heart,

See the time your love will start.

Zachary’s heart began to pound. He closed his eyes.

She’s out there now, quietly waiting,

Red hair, green eyes…fascinating.

And there she was, a clear picture in his mind. Long red hair tumbled over her back, and her green eyes sparkled with laughter.

Warmth filled him from the inside out. Happiness snuck into his bones. No, he didn’t know her yet. Wouldn’t know her for a long time. But one day…

Appearances fool, you have been warned,

Follow your instinct, don’t be torn.

Zachary had no idea what the last lines meant. All he knew was the woman in his head—the woman he saw every time his grandmother, Edna, sang him his lullaby—would eventually be his.

“Eve! I need you to answer me.”

The tingles in her hand ceased. The electricity racing through her arm faded to harmless static, and she lay suspended in the air. Eve opened her eyes, and the world spun around her.

Not standing.

No, she definitely wasn’t standing. She lay horizontal, her right arm hanging limply at her side and the other arm, like the left side of her torso, squashed against a hard wall of warmth.

“Zachary?”

“Wha—? Jesus!”

Ah, it was the adult voice again. The one she recognized. The deep baritone, like the boom of a drum. Jonah’s voice.

Jonah’s body. That’s what she was pressed against. He held her, one arm beneath her knees, the other around her back.

She looked up at him, dazed. “Who’s Edna?”

Jonah blanched.

And then they were moving. Or rather he was moving, striding down the hotel corridor, carrying her. He came to a stop outside a door, and using the wall and his body to support her, dropped one arm and fished around in his pocket. In seconds he had a key card.

He gave it to her. “Take it, please. Open the door.”

Shakily, she slid the card into the lock as he caught her full weight in his arms once again. She pushed the door open.

Jonah had her inside and lying on a couch before the door clicked shut.

“Lie there.” He pointed at her. “Don’t move. Just take a few deep breaths and I’ll be right back.”

Too dizzy to argue, she dropped her head on the cushion and again closed her eyes. The melody of Grandmother Edna’s song drifted through her mind, but she couldn’t remember the words. What she could remember, vividly, were the emotions little Zachary had felt when he heard the song. When he pictured the redhead.

“Are you up to taking a sip of water?”

His voice was close to her ear, and she turned to look at him. Jonah knelt beside the couch, his face pale, his green gaze agitated.

“I think so.”

He wrapped an arm around her shoulders again, lifting her upper body and bringing a glass to her lips.

She took a few sips. “Thank you. That’s enough.”

He settled her down and sat back on his feet, staring at her. No matter how fuzzy she felt from her vision, Jonah’s presence still packed a punch. This close, Eve found it difficult to draw adequate breath.

“You wanna tell me what just happened?”

Images assailed her, one after the other.

Jonah holding the rose. Jonah laughing. The plate full of truffles. Jonah, kissing her, blowing her mind, taking her sanity. The lights. Thousands of flashes, blinding her. The race to escape. And finally, his arm, reaching towards her…

“My hand,” she explained.

He stared at her, baffled.

“You held my hand.”

He narrowed his eyes, as though concentrating. “I did.”

“That’s what happened,” she clarified.

Jonah jumped to his feet. “I’m calling reception. We’ll get you a doctor.”

She shook her head, then wished she hadn’t. It made the dizziness worse. “There’s no need for a doctor. I’m fine.”

“Lady,” Jonah said, obviously worried. “No one has ever zoned out on me like that. You need a doctor.”

“You’ve never held my hand before,” she pointed out.

He leaned over and touched her neck. “You’re white as a sheet and making no sense. Please, let me get someone up here to check you out.”

She grabbed his wrist, holding it tight. “I promise, I’m fine. I just need to get my balance back. This always happens afterwards.”

“What always happens? After what?”

“Hands.” She lifted hers and dropped it back down. “I feel dizzy. Discombobulated. But in a few minutes I’ll be right.”

“And this happens after holding my hand?”

“Not just yours.”

“You get dizzy when you hold anyone’s hand?”

“No, only certain people.”

Jonah shoved a hand through his hair. “Jesus, Eve, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

She sighed and looked up at the ceiling before closing her eyes again. The giddiness subsided quicker if she kept them shut. “I have a…gift. A talent, you might call it.”

“What kind of gift?”

“The gift of sight.”

Silence, then, “Oh.” More silence. “Huh?”

“I see things. Images, snippets, pieces of people’s lives.”

Her words were met with more silence.

She took a deep, fortifying breath. Let the freak show begin.

“Often, when I hold a person’s hand, I’m hit with flashes of that person’s life. Sometimes it’s an image of the past, sometimes the present and sometimes the future. If I don’t know the person well, it’s impossible to tell which it is.”

“Hell.” The word was a whisper.

“Sometimes it’s a picture, like a photograph. Sometimes just words or maybe a conversation I overhear. Maybe I’ll see images, like I’m watching a movie, but there are times when it’s much more than that.”

“Much more how?”

“I merge with the person whose hand I’m holding. Become one with him or her. Instead of seeing the vision like a passive observer, I become part of it. Live it like the person has—or will.”

What Eve neglected to tell Jonah was the latter only happened when the person whose hand she held had significance in her life. It was almost as though the more important that person was to her, the more she saw.

At the best of times, Eve’s visions left her rattled. But this one, this snippet of Jonah’s life, worried her like none ever had before.

She didn’t know the man. Had met him just a few hours ago. They’d shared nothing more than harmless conversation and a few roses. Oh, yeah, and a soul-shattering kiss. And yet she’d merged with him. Lived his life.

At least she assumed it was his life.

“Jonah?”

“Yeah?” He sounded distracted.

“Who’s Zachary?”

This time the silence stretched on endlessly.

Eve couldn’t bear it. It echoed through her ears, deafening her. She opened her eyes and looked at him, only to find him staring back, his expression confused, cautious.

“That’s the second time you’ve said the name,” he finally said.

“I merged with him. A child named Zachary.”

“What did he look like?”

Eve shrugged. “I don’t know. While I could see what he saw and hear what he heard, I couldn’t see him.” She hummed the song Edna had sung.

Jonah’s jaw dropped.

“His grandmother was singing to him.” The word struck a chord. Hadn’t Jonah spoken about his grandmother earlier, when he’d first given her the roses?

“His grandmother?” Jonah’s eyes widened.

“Edna.” The refined, beautifully dressed woman. “Brown eyes, brown hair. Although she was graying, rather grandly I might add.”

Jonah collapsed into a chair. “My grandmother.”

“Edna’s your grandmother?”

“Was.” His face fell. “She died a few years ago.”

She left him to his thoughts, let him assimilate what she’d told him. Though the visions were different every time, she was used to them. She’d been having them for eleven years, ever since the explosion. This was all brand new for him.

“Zachary? The kid you saw…or merged with?”

“Yeah?”

“That’s me.”

“You’re Zachary?”

“Zachary Pace. It’s my real name.”

“What about Jonah?”

“Stage name. And middle name.”

“Ah.”

And then they were both silent for a while.

Jonah came to sit beside her on the couch, perching on the edge of the cushions. She scooched up to make space for him.

“Tell me more. Tell me all of it.”

She told him, describing everything she’d seen and heard.

Jonah stared. “That lullaby my grandmother sang was her special song for me. She and I were the only ones who knew it. Until now, no one else has ever heard it.”

“It seemed to make you happy.”

He smiled. “It did. It gave me a sense of my future.”

“So, have you met her yet?”

“Met who?”

“Your future. The redhead from your imagination.” Her heart squeezed painfully as she asked.

He blinked. “Y-you saw that too?”

“I was you, Jonah. I was Zachary. Whatever you felt or thought that night, I felt and thought.” She’d experienced his sheer contentment at the idea of meeting the redhead. Contentment, happiness, excitement and anticipation.

Which was odd, really, because although she’d experienced all of Jonah’s feelings, they weren’t hers. Her personal emotions were quite different. She was put out, fiercely disappointed and…jealous.

“Jesus, this is weird.” He rubbed a hand over his face. “Bizarre.”

To say the least.

What was weird for Eve, however, was that she’d told Jonah about her vision. There were times she didn’t mention having them at all. She’d yank her hand away and brush over it, explaining away her dizziness with arbitrary excuses like she must have stood up too fast, or that she hadn’t eaten all day.

But with Jonah she hadn’t thought twice. She’d told him.

“Look, I know how wacky this all sounds. If it helps at all, I did try to avoid it happening.”

“You did?”

“Earlier, when you offered to shake my hand, I kinda sensed something would happen, so I refused you. Twice.” She knew it must have come across as rude, but hey, better rude than invasive, right?

“You knocked my arm away.”

“I did.” Still aware of the jealousy niggling at her belly, she pressed him for an answer. “So, have you?”

“Have I what?

“Met her yet?” Another painful squeeze of the heart.

“You don’t pull punches, do you?”

“You kissed me earlier. Kissed me like you meant it.” Or maybe she’d been the one kissing him like she meant it. Just remembering the touch of his lips against hers—the glide of his tongue, the taste of his breath—brought a fresh wave of goose bumps racing over her spine and made her belly dip and jump. “If the woman of your fantasies is in your life, I want no part of your kisses.”

Not true!

Eve wasn’t exactly sure which part of her had yelled that. Her heart? Her mind? Her soul? Her…pussy?

“I did mean it.” His gaze met hers, and his lips softened in a sensual smile, making her heart slam into her ribs. “Didn’t mean to do it in front of all those people though, but I couldn’t help myself. You made eating that chocolate look like a sexual feast.” He closed his eyes for a second and licked his lower lip as though remembering the kiss and how the chocolate had tasted on her tongue.

The action caught her deep in her belly and brought back the breathless wonder she’d experienced when he kissed her.

“Th-then we’re even, because you make breathing look like an erotic festival.” She took a deep breath, steadying her pounding heart. “But, mate, that’s beside the point. You’ve once again avoided answering my question.”

“Maybe that’s because you don’t ask the easiest of questions.”

“See? Another non-answer.”

He eyed her thoughtfully.

Eve sighed and pushed up into a sitting position. The dizziness had subsided, and she felt stupid lying on the couch.

Jonah shifted to give her space. Even so, she had to shuffle awkwardly to get her legs around him and put her feet on the floor. She accidentally rubbed her calves against his side in the process.

Shockwaves pulsed through her at the contact. Sharp pulses of energy that set her blood on fire and awakened every nerve ending in her body.

But it was time to ground herself firmly in Eve-world again. Time to remind herself she had no place in Jonah Speed’s hotel room. Or life, for that matter. There was no point getting all worked up because Jonah had kissed her once. And given her flowers.

She was just Eve Andrews, the scarred girl from down the road. Even if Jonah’s interest in her had been genuine before now, she’d have destroyed it all with her freak show.

Just like she’d destroyed any possible relationship with her little talent. Men tended to run a mile when they discovered her “gift”. If her scars didn’t chase them off beforehand. And generally, the visions weren’t necessary. Men took one look at her face…and fled.

She stood up. “Look, Jonah, I’m sorry. I’m prying into issues I have no business prying into. Shoving my nose where it doesn’t belong.”

“Zachary.”

“Pardon?”

“Please, call me Zachary. You’ve seen inside my head, it hardly seems right that you keep calling me Jonah.”

“I’m sorry about that too…Zachary.” It was a nice name. Suited him. She fidgeted nervously and took a step back. “About finding out your name when you obviously never intended for me to know. I’m sorry you got caught up in one of my visions. It’s not only unfair to you, it’s an extreme invasion of your privacy.”

“It’s not your fault.” He turned his palm upward and looked at it. “You tried to avoid my hand, but I never gave you a choice.”

“Still, you never gave me permission to enter your head. It’s not cool.” She took another step back, this time turning around to look for the door. It was time to leave.

For the first time she noticed they weren’t just in a small hotel room like hers. They were in a suite. A luxurious suite in the Crown Towers with a huge lounge and dining room, a door leading off to what she assumed was a bedroom, an entryway where a set of drums stood, and a wall of windows, which must offer sweeping views of Melbourne in the daytime. Even now, the city lights twinkled behind the glass.

“Are you going somewhere?” His question drew her attention back to him.

“Back to my room. I’ve outstayed my welcome.”

“I put off answering your question, Tiny. That doesn’t mean I want you to leave.”

“I freaked you out.”

“You…surprised me.”

“I invaded your privacy.”

“You shared something I hadn’t expected you to find out about.”

“I like chocolate.”

“Uh…yeah.” He frowned. “What does that have to do with anything?”

“You don’t.”

“Don’t what?”

“Like chocolate.”

“Didn’t,” he corrected, running his tongue along his lower lip again. “Until I tasted it from your perspective. And that taste is something I could grow addicted to in a heartbeat.” He held a hand up in question. “Still, I don’t see why having different taste in food means you have to leave.”

“Okay, then let’s just be honest. You’re famous, I’m not. You’re Jonah Speed, I’m just someone with a strange gift.”

“What the hell does fame have to do with this?”

“You’re out of my league, Jonah.”

“Zachary.”

“Zachary’s out of my league too.”

“How can you say that?”

“You kissed me and a thousand flashes went off. That puts you—Jonah and Zachary—in a different league. One I can’t deal with.”

“I’m sorry about that. I shouldn’t have kissed you in front of all those people.”

“Jeez.” She ran a hand over her cheek. “I’ve known you a few hours and I swear we’ve apologized to each other ten times already.”

“Don’t get me wrong, Eve. I’m sorry I kissed you in front of all those people, sorry I called all that attention to us. I’m not sorry I kissed you.”

“Yeah?” Well, didn’t that just make her heart race like crazy? “I bet you’re sorry you grabbed my hand afterwards.”

He thought about his answer. “I liked the feel of your hand in mine.”

“And the craziness that came after?”

“It surprised me.” He smiled then. “But it’s nice to share my grandmother’s song with someone. Nice someone could hear it after all this time. It brings back good memories.”

Of course it did. Memories of his red-haired future. She stumbled, unsure what to say next.

“The answer’s no, by the way.”

She raised an eyebrow in question.

“The redhead you asked about. I haven’t met her yet.”

Yet.

“So you still think about her?”

“Damn.” He gave her a rueful smile. “You just zone right in on those difficult questions.”

Eve could have kicked herself. After apologizing for invading his privacy, she’d gone straight back and done it again. She raised her hands in defeat. “I’m sorry. Again. Look, I’ll just go now. Leave you in peace.”

“Of course I think about her.”

She blinked. “You didn’t need to tell me.”

“I know I didn’t. I wanted to.”

“You wanted to?”

He nodded. “There’s something else you should know. Something else I want to tell you.” His stomach punctuated his words with a loud growl. Zachary smiled. “And if you just give me a minute to order something to eat, I’ll tell you all about it.”

He walked over to the phone, pressed one of the buttons and waited.

Her hand strummed over her cheek. What on earth could she need to know?

“Yeah, can I get room service up here…? Excellent.”

He looked at her with a question in her eyes and pointed to the receiver.

She shook her head. Her stomach was in no state to fill it with food.

As Zachary placed his order, his gaze caught hers again, and there went her heart, beating like crazy once more. “And one extra-large serving of chocolate mousse,” he said into the receiver. “…Fifteen minutes? Cool, I’ll be here.” He hung up.

“I thought you hated chocolate mousse?”

“I do.” His green gaze held hers. “It’s for you.”

And that was all it took for something to shift in her chest. Like a gear changing, her emotions were suddenly tumultuous. Zachary Jonah Speed Pace had just become a very serious threat to her heart. If Eve didn’t do everything in her power to protect it, she feared she could easily gift-wrap it—with a ribbon—and hand it over to the man before her.

“Zachary…”

A soft groan escaped his lips. “Christ, I don’t know what you’re thinking, but the look on your face makes me think about sex. Hot, heavy, dirty sex.”

She opened her mouth, then closed it again, helpless to respond. Not when the very heart she feared she’d lose to him now felt like it sat in her throat, pumping like crazy.

The air around them sparked. Currents of heat and electricity snapped from him to her.

“Perhaps…” Zachary swallowed. “Perhaps I’d better tell you my story before I completely lose the ability to talk.

Chapter Four

Zachary sat back down on the couch and patted the cushion beside him. “Sit with me?”

Eve chewed her bottom lip.

“Please?”

She gave a quick nod but walked toward him so slowly Zachary realized she must have misgivings.

“I swear not to bite. Or hold your hand.” More than that he couldn’t promise. He was going to touch her. Zachary wanted to get his hands on her more than he wanted his next breath.

Still her uncertainty troubled him. “If it makes you feel better, you’re not the only one who’s had visions.”

Her jaw dropped. “Wh-what?”

Yep. That had pretty much been his reaction to her confession about her visions. It had taken him a good few minutes to get over his shock.

He looked pointedly at the seat beside him until she perched her tight little butt on the edge of it.

Zachary was having none of that. He placed his hands around her waist, pulled her close and tucked her into his side, leaving his arm around her shoulders so he could run his hands through her silky hair.

Where to begin his story?

From the place Eve had popped into it, obviously. “You saw her. You saw the redhead in my imagination. She’s my vision.”

At the mention of his fated one, Eve tried to pull away.

Zachary wouldn’t let her. Didn’t want to let her go. “Uh-uh. I heard about your vision. It’s only fair you hear about mine.”

She gave an exasperated sigh. “I’ll listen. But could you please just move your arm while you talk?”

“I could. But I need to touch you. Want to touch you so bad, it’s like a physical compulsion.” He gave in to his desire and wound his hand through her locks, letting his fingertips brush over her scalp.

Ah. Better. Much better.

The muscles in her cheek twitched, as though she was having an internal debate, and finally, almost reluctantly, she settled back on the couch.

He tapped his fingers against her scalp in a slow, sensuous beat that he heard in his head. He seemed to hear a beat in his head whenever she stepped up close. A beat that tied his balls in knots and made his chest ache just a bit.

He enjoyed the way her hair feathered over his hand and wrist. Enjoyed just having her there, beside him. Enjoyed the music she inspired in him.

“It first happened when I was very young, about four or five,” Zachary told her.

She turned to face him, watching him while he spoke. Her blue eyes held him captive.

“It was the first time my grandmother sang me the lullaby. She took my hand, held it in hers, and explained the song she was about to sing was meant for my ears only. Said it would be our secret song.” The memory was clear, as though it had taken place yesterday. “Nothing happened until she began to sing. And then I felt these…I don’t know, chills running through my hand and up my arm.” He frowned. Kind of like the chills he’d felt when Eve had zoned out on him. “Before I knew it, I couldn’t see my grandmother anymore. She’d disappeared. Everything had disappeared. All I heard was her song.”

Zachary hummed the tune and sang the first two lines of the lullaby.

Eve caught her breath. Her eyes turned a shade darker, her pupils suddenly enormous. She stared at him, riveted, and let her head relax into his hand as though she’d given herself over to his touch, to the rhythm of his fingers against her skull.

Which was a good thing, because he couldn’t get enough of the feel of her.

“Nothing else happened…at first. And then there she was. The woman you saw. She just stood before me, smiling, laughing, as though she was having a wonderful time. Then she waved at me, beckoned me over…”

He blinked. God, she’d been so real. Was still real. Every time he imagined her, he heard the tinkle of her laughter.

“The vision lasted the length of the lullaby, and when my grandmother stopped singing and pulled her hand away, she was gone.”

Eve swallowed. “Have…” She stopped, cleared her throat and tried again. “Have you seen her since then? Had any other visions?”

“Whenever my grandmother sang the lullaby after that, I saw her face as clear as the first time. And if she was holding my hand while she sang, I felt the chills too. Now I don’t need to hear the song, I just see her in my mind.”

Eve closed her eyes, opened them again. She glanced at him then quickly looked away. “How did you feel? When you saw her that first time?”

Zachary concentrated, recalling what he’d experienced. “Confused. Surprised. I didn’t know what was happening.”

“That’s all?”

“At the time, yes. But over the years, I started to feel a whole barrage of emotions. Shock, bewilderment, longing, torment and then happiness.” A blaze of happiness. An all-consuming happiness, so intense it had burst through his chest like lightning. That’s when he’d known, sensed, that the woman was important. More than important. She was vital. She was—or would be—the one to make his life complete.

As a child he hadn’t stopped to question or analyze the knowledge or the experience. He’d simply accepted it, internalized it. He’d made it a part of himself.

From that day on, he’d lived with the certainty that one day he would meet her. One day she would become central to his life.

“Most of what I felt was too complex for my immature brain to process. But one thing I did understand was that she was mine. Or meant to be mine. Not then. Not when I was a child, but sometime down the line, further in my future.”

She chewed her lip some more, and even though the redhead occupied his thoughts, his body responded to Eve. Blood raced to his groin as desire struck him, bam, in the chest.

“She’s your destiny?”

“I believe so.”

Eve sighed. “You’re lucky. To know what’s in store for you. Who’s in store for you. My visions…they’re never about me. Only the person whose hand I’m holding.”

“I am lucky, I guess.” He shrugged. “I know she’s out there, somewhere. But it makes it tough to live in the present sometimes. Especially when I meet someone I…like. Someone who doesn’t have red hair or green eyes.”

Zachary searched her face as he spoke. He liked Eve. Very much. Liked her brown hair and blue eyes. And for now he didn’t want to think about his red-haired beauty. He wanted to live in the present. Enjoy the present. Enjoy Eve.

“Which leads me to ask, once again, why me, Zachary? Why single me out? Why—” Her voice hitched as he ran his hand from her hair, over her ear and down her cheek. Something flashed through her eyes.

Panic?

She twisted her head, freeing herself of his hand, and the panic abated, as though it had never been there. “Why look at me the way you’re looking at me now?”

Why? Because she both intrigued and worried him. Because she was either scared or scarred, and for a second there panicked too, and he wanted to know her better so he could ask about it. Maybe even comfort her.

But those weren’t the only reasons. Not by a long shot.

“Because I like you. I like the fact that you’re not scared to call me out when you think I’ve done something wrong, and I like how easily I can talk to you.” He liked it although it confounded him. As Jonah, he’d mastered the art of charming fans, but he always did it with a sense of aloofness. He never spoke about himself. He made the chatter about them, not about him.

With Eve, he couldn’t do that. Didn’t want to. With Eve he wanted to talk about himself and about her. He wanted it to get personal.

And still those weren’t all the reasons he stared at her like he did.

“Because, Eve Andrews, regardless of what my future may or may not have in store, I can’t deny that you turn me on. You make me think ridiculously horny thoughts about you and me.” Which made him think of something else he liked about her. “And I really appreciate that you’re not doing whatever you can to get me into bed.”

She harrumphed and muttered under her breath, “Just because I’m not doing it doesn’t mean I’m not thinking about it.”

Bam.

Jesus, this woman was like one punch after the next.

Here he sat, talking about his future, the woman he saw himself spending his life with, and all he could think about was getting closer to Eve, touching her way more intimately than a mere hand through her hair.

He wanted her naked and panting beneath him. And on top of him.

He grinned. Couldn’t help it. “You wanna get me into bed, Tiny?”

She closed her eyes and dropped her head against the back of the couch. Her nipples pebbled beneath her T-shirt, temptation personified. “More than I want my next breath. Doesn’t mean I’m gonna act on it.”

Funny. He’d used that exact expression just minutes ago. He forced his gaze from her chest to her face. “Even if I ask nicely?” Or beg. Loudly.

Zachary’s cock already stood at half-mast. If he did ask nicely—or beg loudly—Eve would have no trouble spotting his predicament the second she chose to open her eyes again.

“Back off, Pace. You have a woman in your life.”

“Not yet, I don’t. And I’m not saving myself for her. That would be impractical and probably very, very lonely.” Who knew how long he’d have to wait. He could be an old man by the time he met her.

She opened one eye, looking at him accusingly through it. “Well don’t expect me to go filling the void until she comes along.”

Somehow he doubted spending time with Eve would ever count as just filling a void. “Ya know, there are no cameras around us now. If I kissed you, no one would ever know. You wouldn’t have to poke me in the eye.” Fuck, he wanted to kiss her again. Wanted it so bad he could taste the chocolate on his tongue.

“I’d know. And so would you.”

Of course he’d know. He wanted to know. He turned his whole body toward her, not so subtly trying to get closer. “So you’re not feeling that buzz?” He whispered the question, although he hadn’t meant to. The electricity that seemed to zap around them, like tiny prickles of excitement on his skin, must have affected his vocal abilities too. “You don’t want to kiss me now?

She looked away, her gaze resting on her arms—which were covered in goose bumps, just like his. “I never said that.” Her words brought his gaze to her lips. To those cherry-red lips, just asking to be kissed. “But that’s irrelev—”

Zachary didn’t give her a chance to finish. Couldn’t.

He pounced.

One second Eve sat beside him, avoiding his gaze, the next she lay on her back—pinned to the couch by one very aroused man—staring at him with wide eyes.

“What are you—”

Zachary kissed her. Took her mouth with his and swallowed the rest of her words. He swallowed her surprised yelp too. A rational thought, buried somewhere deep in his mind, tried to make itself known. Tried to warn him that if he didn’t back off soon, he’d find himself in deep waters with Eve Andrews. Too deep for him to swim back out of.

But he couldn’t focus on it, couldn’t listen.

Not when Eve’s surprise turned into hunger. Not when her mouth responded with a fervor similar to his own. Not when she parted her lips and let his tongue in, let him explore and taste.

And definitely not when she moaned softly beneath him and her hand crept over his shoulder to grasp his neck, holding him to her.

Blood emptied into his groin. He was hard as a fucking rock. His erection pushed against her leg, reminding him all over again how tiny she was. How fragile. Like a porcelain doll beneath him. Never mind her mouth, he could crush her with his body.

But that didn’t seem to faze her. Didn’t seem to stop her from pulling him closer, from bending one knee and slipping her foot around his thigh, twining her leg with his.

Fearing he might injure her with his bulk, Zachary pushed up, holding his upper body weight on his lower arms. But, damn it, he couldn’t move off her altogether. Couldn’t break contact. He rocked over her, against her, arching his back so he could rock his erection over her pussy.

Fuck. If that didn’t clear his lungs of oxygen and his head of thought…

Eve twined her other arm around his shoulder and used him shamelessly to lift herself up, press her body against his.

She rocked in time with him, gripped his leg tighter with hers.

Her breasts grazed his chest. Those pert breasts he’d admired earlier, and damned if he didn’t wish their shirts away. Didn’t wish it was her naked flesh tantalizing his.

And then Eve groaned, louder this time, a groan vibrating with frustration. She pulled her mouth away and dropped back onto the couch, breaking contact.

She swore under her breath as she slipped her arms from around his neck and her foot off his leg.

He chased her mouth, intent on possessing it again, possessing her. All of her. He’d imagined her naked chest against his, and God help him, he wanted it. Wanted her, naked. Beneath him. Or on top of him. Both. First one then the other.

But she stopped him. Placed her hand on his chest and halted his descent.

“Door,” she whispered, her voice a husky murmur.

“Huh?” Her lips were full, red, and so damn tempting he wanted to pull that lower one into his mouth and suck on it.

“Someone…at…door.”

It took him a good few seconds to comprehend her meaning. Impossible to think when his head was so full of her. When her floral scent baffled his senses and her chocolaty taste filled his mouth. Impossible to focus on anything but the feel of her all wrapped around him.

“Food,” she said. “Room service?”

Ah. Right. Of course. Room service.

Reluctantly Zachary pushed himself off the couch.

He ran a hand over his swollen lips and took several breaths, not at all calmed by the fresh oxygen. His balls were tight knots and his dick an aching rod squashed by his jeans. “This…” He lifted a finger in the air and motioned between the two of them. “This is not over. Not by a long shot.”

Then he turned around and headed to the door, adjusting his jeans as he walked. For the second time that night he was facing the public with an erection.

Jesus, wasn’t he doing a stand-up job of holding on to his saintly image of the self-restrained rock star?

“A butler? Seriously?” Eve stared at the crisp, white cloth that now covered the dining table, along with the silver cutlery and the two formal place settings. In her world, room service involved a tray. End of story.

Zachary shrugged. “Luke books us in as VIPs. Sure you won’t have a bite?” He motioned to this burger.

”Not for me, thanks.” But she couldn’t stop her gaze from straying to the mousse.

Zachary grinned. “Will you just sit down already and eat it?”

Eve couldn’t resist. She sat opposite him and tucked in, watching while he ate.

“Want some fries?” he offered.

“We call them chips here. And no thanks.”

“You speak funny here.”

Ah. That just proved her earlier point. “See? I told you we lived in different leagues. Different worlds.”

“Ever hear the expression opposites attract?”

“Ever try responding with an answer, not a question?”

“Fine.” He paused, burger in hand. “I like our differences. They make us more interesting to each other.”

Eve frowned. She didn’t find Zachary Pace interesting. She found him fascinating. And it wasn’t just a matter of physical attraction for her. It was more like a magnetic force that kept her in his suite. She couldn’t pull herself away. Didn’t want to. After their second kiss, she doubted she’d ever want to leave his side.

Jonah Speed, aloof and mysterious, had to be the sexiest man alive. He was smoldering sex and savage sensuality. Zachary Pace, warm, engaging, caring and talkative, had to be the most alluring. And the two of them together? A lethal combination, for sure, one that even now chipped away at her defenses, drilled into her heart and kept her hungry to discover more about him.

Which was daft, really. She should get her ass out of his room, break the spell he held her under and go back to Eve-world. And she would. Definitely. Just as soon as she’d polished off the chocolate mousse, which honestly, was more delicious than any hotel-made mousse had a right to be.

Or maybe her taste buds were just stimulated beyond reason. Because when Zachary had kissed her again, she’d known, with absolute certainty, nothing had ever tasted or felt better. Her response had been visceral. She’d felt it in every cell of her body, every nerve ending. And every one of those nerve endings still zinged, leaving her skin hypersensitive to even the slightest breeze. His gaze felt like a zillion tingles whistling over her flesh.

“I haven’t forgotten about your redhead, you know.” Was that a warning to him or to her?

“Neither have I,” he said honestly. “And I never will. She’s been a part of me since I was a kid. That doesn’t mean I’m a saint, Eve. It doesn’t mean I haven’t had flings or girlfriends or fallen in love before. Doesn’t mean I find you any less attractive. She’s not here now, and I intend to live my life to the fullest before she arrives.”

He set his knife and fork down and changed the subject. “Ya know, I would leave every last bite of food on this plate, maybe even give up food for good, if you would come on over here and let me feed you that chocolate mousse.”

She blinked. “Y-you want to feed me?”

“I want to watch, close up, how you savor every spoonful. The look on your face, the dreaminess in your eyes… It’s like you’re having an orgasm. Or approaching one fast.” He swallowed. “Get on over here. I wanna witness it up close.”

“W-why?”

“Because, it’s sexy as sin. And watching you eat is giving me the hard-on from hell.” He groaned softly and pushed his chair back, standing. “Forget it,” he rasped. “Don’t move. Not an inch.”

The second he rose, she spotted that hard-on. It was impossible to miss. And damn, it did funny things to those tingles on her skin. Intensified them. Made them feel like sharp darts of carnal need.

And then he was beside her, taking the spoon from her hand and dipping it into the bowl. “Open wide, beautiful.”

He held the spoon to her mouth.

She stared up at him, stunned, trying not to think about the erection from hell, which honestly she equated much more with heaven, the one mere inches from her cheek.

“Open,” he urged in that deep baritone of his. It sent shivers down her spine.

She opened.

A soft growl of satisfaction filled the air, and he touched the spoon to her lower lip, drawing it over the sensitive skin before pulling his hand away.

Drops of mousse stuck to her lip, and she licked them off, dabbing at them first with her tongue, then with her teeth, cleaning away every last bit.

The creaminess of the mousse burst on her tongue, an explosion of rich sweetness, made even sweeter by the fact Zachary fed her.

Another soft, masculine growl reverberated down her spine, and the spoon was back. This time he let her have a mouthful. It melted on her tongue, the flavor sparking every one of her taste buds.

He fed her another spoonful, and then another.

Eating became almost impossible. It was hard to swallow when his gaze tracked her every move, his green eyes not moving from her mouth.

Each time she licked her lips, he mimicked her, licking his own lips until his mouth glistened. She couldn’t look away, didn’t want to.

Neither did she want another spoon of mousse. Not anymore. Now it was Zachary she burned to taste. His mouth, his lips, his kiss.

His erection.

Zachary touched the spoon to her lower lip again and then to her upper one.

“Uh-uh,” he breathed when she attempted to lick them clean. He placed the spoon in the bowl. “My turn.”

She couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t remember how. Her heart hammered as he caught her chin with his finger, tilted her face upwards, and ever so slowly leaned in.

Helpless beneath his touch, her eyes slid shut.

Zachary flicked his tongue over her upper lip, just a whisper of wet heat as he licked at a drop of mousse. And then another one. He took his time, savoring the treat, tasting every inch of her lip.

A soft rumble of appreciation resonated in his chest.

Sensation, wicked and frantic, washed over Eve, making her shiver.

Zachary turned his attention to her lower lip. Only he didn’t sweep his tongue over it. No, this time he caught it between his lips and nibbled.

Desire rocketed through her, fierce and hot. Her knees turned to jelly and moisture pooled between her legs. She couldn’t hold back the moan as he suckled on her lip.

Eve was a violent inferno of need and want and lust, while Zachary was all gentle touches and soft caresses. He released her lip only to press his mouth against hers and run his tongue ever so slowly over her teeth and her tongue.

His moan echoed her own.

As fierce and demanding as the previous two kisses had been, so this one was tender. And beautiful. And delicious.

It captivated her. He captivated her.

Eve returned the kiss, tangling her tongue with his, molding her lips to the shape of his. She wanted to attack. Wanted to kiss him harder, make him hers. Damn, she wanted to own his mouth. Own him.

Or maybe she wanted him to own her.

She tamped down on her rampant excitement, on her fervor. Forced herself to move at his speed. To slow down and appreciate the moment for what it was.

A perfect kiss. An exquisite experience. A blissful blending of man and woman. It was almost as if Eve had been born to share this moment with this man. Born to share his mouth, his passion, his tenderness. Born to breathe the air he breathed.

Which was ridiculous really, as she hadn’t been born with red hair or green eyes.

The thought hurt, slamming home, and instinctively Eve tried to kill the moment, pulling away. Zachary refused to let her go.

He simply kissed her harder, more ardently, as Eve had desired. Trapped her with his mouth and wouldn’t release her lips.

Heat tingled up her back and down her arms. Her breasts grew heavy, needy. And still he increased the heat of his kiss, ramping it up, caressing her lips with his, seducing her with his tongue.

She lost herself to the zeal of his mouth, lost herself to the rapture, to the storm building in her belly…and lower. The muscles in her pussy clenched, fed by a voracious hunger. A desperate need for more of Zachary. So much more.

He broke the kiss, breathing heavily. His eyes were heavy-lidded as he forced them open and stared at her, seemingly dazed.

“I haven’t slept with a woman in months, Eve. Haven’t wanted to.” He closed his eyes with a hoarse groan. “But God help me, I want you. Want you so bad.”

His mouth reclaimed hers, his words still echoing in her ears like the soft beat of a drum, rhythmic, hypnotic, making her heart pound.

His arm snaked around her waist, pulling her upright, pulling her against him, lifting her into the air. He held her so tight, not even air could pass between them. Her breasts were squashed against his chest, her hips pressed into his stomach as her legs found their way around his waist, clutching him.

At some point her arms had wound themselves around his neck, holding him just as close as he held her.

All the while he kissed her, seduced her with his sinful mouth, made her think dirty thoughts. Made her want wicked, delicious things from him.

He turned and rested her ass on the table, nestling between her thighs, his groin pressed against hers, the stiffness of his erection a solid bulge against her aching pussy.

His mouth devoured hers, his chest rubbed against her swollen breasts. Her nipples beaded and throbbed with the hunger to be touched—skin upon skin.

Somehow he must have understood, because his hands found the hem of her shirt, and just like she’d wanted to do in the stadium—and every time she’d looked at him since—he tugged it up and over her shoulders, breaking their kiss only to pull it over her head.

Too late Eve realized what she’d let him do.

Swept away in the wave that was Zachary, she’d forgotten.

Panic struck.

Her heart thudded as dread filled her belly. Instinctively, she dropped her right hand to her left shoulder, trying to hide the damage that could no longer be hidden.

Chapter Five

With her throat thick from words that refused to form, Eve found the strength to whisper just one thing.

“Scars.”

Zachary’s face darkened as his gaze lowered to her shoulder, as he took in what her hand couldn’t conceal.

She waited for the horror to set in, waited for the revulsion she knew would come. It always came when she revealed the long, pink line that ran from the top of her left shoulder, down over the upper curve of her breast—not quite covered by the cup of her bra—and ended halfway down her sternum.

“Scars,” he repeated, oh so quietly. But it wasn’t revulsion she saw on his face. It was something else. Something she couldn’t identify.

She held her breath, waited, wished she were anywhere but there.

Turn away, Zachary. Don’t look. Don’t recognize how hideous I am.

Then he nodded, as if it all made sense. “Not scared. Scarred.”

Huh?

His expression changed again. This time to concern? “Christ, Tiny.” He traced the line of the scar with a touch so gentle it raised goose bumps on her flesh. “What happened to you?”

It took a few seconds before she could answer. A few seconds of processing his response. It was so unexpected, so tender.

So free of the expected revulsion.

Her heart softened, letting Zachary in. Letting the man step closer—both physically and emotionally—than anyone had gotten to her in a very long time.

It wasn’t easy. Eve fought the need to rail against him. Fought the need to pound her fists on his shoulders and force him to look away. Fought the impulse to cover her repulsive body and run.

She fought, because more than wanting to flee and escape his intense scrutiny, she wanted this time with Zachary. Wanted a chance with him. A minute, an hour. Maybe even a night.

She couldn’t have him forever, not with his redhead looming in his future. But just for now, after the kiss they’d shared, the intimacy that had somehow flowered between them, she wanted…something. With him.

Just for now.

“I…was…” She swallowed and forced the words out. “Injured, eleven years ago. A—” Lord, she didn’t want to tell him. Didn’t want to say it, remember it. “A shop window I was looking in exploded.”

“Jesus.” He stared some more, his brow puckered, his eyes troubled. “Fuck, this must have hurt like hell.”

He didn’t know the half of it.

She shrugged and closed her eyes, telling him silently she couldn’t, wouldn’t answer more questions. She rounded her shoulders, forcing herself to let him look, but this was something she simply wasn’t open to discussing.

Perhaps Zachary sensed as much, because the next thing Eve knew, it wasn’t his fingers feathering over the scar, it was his lips. His soft, warm lips tracing that line from her shoulder, over her breast and down to her sternum. And his tongue, leaving a tingly wet trail that made her belly tumble and her head wobble with confusion.

She flicked her eyes open to stare down at his beautiful brown hair. “Y-you don’t find it repulsive?”

He pressed a kiss to the top of her breastbone. “Find what repulsive?”

“The scar.”

He raised his head to look at her. “Why on earth would I find it repulsive?”

Him and his damn non-answers. “I have a line bisecting the left side of my upper body, Zachary. It’s hardly a visual delight.”

“It’s a scar, Eve. A mark left by what could only have been a physical trauma.” He traced it again with his finger. “The only thing that worries me about it is how fucking much you must have suffered when it happened.”

“Y-you don’t want me to put my shirt on? Go back to my room now?”

Now he stared at her as if she were crazy. “Are you nuts?” He took a step away, a tiny step, and caught her wrist in his hand. “Feel me, Eve. Put your hand over my erection and get a sense of what you to do to me.”

He directed her palm to his groin, making sure, Eve noted, to avoid hand-to-hand contact. “That’s it, Tiny. Press your hand flat against me, so you know how fucking much you turn me on. So you know that every inch of you, scarred or not, arouses me like no one has aroused me before.”

She pressed her palm to his groin, allowed his hard length to fill her hand, and let out a tiny rasp of air.

Yeah, she’d felt him pressed against her before, felt his excitement then, but to feel it now, after he’d seen the visible evidence of her trauma, to know he still wanted her…

God, it was a powerful aphrodisiac. And a powerful boost to her confidence.

“Now—” he snagged her other wrist, “—feel what your holding my cock is doing to my heart.” He placed her hand over his chest.

The thud of his pulse beat against her palm, firm, fast and pounding.

“It’s racing,” she whispered. Her eyes closed as she let his heart beat against her hand, felt his lifeblood pulsing through his chest. “Like your drums, only faster.”

“It’s the rhythm of my heart, Eve. Listen carefully. It’s beating like this because of you.”

“Zachary…”

“Your scar doesn’t scare me. But the thought of your walking away because you’re embarrassed by it does.”

Eve stared at him in wonder. This devastatingly sexual specimen of a man, who inspired hysteria in his fans, desired Eve. He wasn’t fazed by the disfigurement of her chest. Not even one bit.

The man standing before her—with his heart in her hand—made her feel things the scarred, traumatized girl hadn’t felt in, well, ever.

He made her desire things she hadn’t felt worthy of desiring.

Even if the visible scar was just the tip of the iceberg, the sense of being wanted, of being appreciated made her dizzy. It made her emotions crash around like crazy.

“I don’t want to walk away, Zachary.”

Stupidly, speaking out loud made her eyes fill with tears. Which in turn brought back a wave of panic. For the first time in so very, very long, Eve was happy. And sexy. And beautiful. And she had Zachary Pace to thank for that.

The last thing she needed to do now was destroy his image of her with tears. Because if those tears spilled over and wet her cheeks, that image would be torn to shreds—just like her face had been, eleven years ago.

“Oh, shit.” Zachary looked stricken. “Now I’ve made you cry.”

Hastily she brushed at her eyes. Much as she hated to move her hand away from the rhythm of his heart, it would do her no good whatsoever ruining her makeup now. Zachary may have accepted the scar on her chest. There was no need to subject him to the other ones.

“They’re good tears,” she insisted. “Emotional, not sad.”

He frowned. “There’s a difference?”

“There is. You’re making me feel things I’ve never allowed myself to feel. It’s good. Liberating. Scary, but good.”

Obviously Eve wasn’t doing a good enough job convincing him. Zachary’s erection began to shrink.

“You make me feel beautiful,” she told him. “Make me feel like my scars…this scar is just a natural part of me.” Time to be brave. “You make me want to show you more of myself.” Well, more of her body anyway. Her face—her real face—could remain hidden.

Some scars were way too hard to reveal.

Eve reached behind her back and unclasped her bra. She let it fall to the floor between Zachary and herself.

His harsh intake of breath as he looked his fill was all the reward she needed for her courage, yet he showered her with more.

“Jesus.” He swallowed. “You’re beautiful.” And slowly, almost reverently, he cupped her breasts, groaning hoarsely in appreciation. “You feel so good. So right.”

“I don’t have red hair,” she reminded him. “Or green eyes.”

Zachary dismissed yet another of her concerns. “You have everything I need or want right now. More than everything.”

He ran his thumbs over her nipples, and Eve shuddered as shivers rippled through her.

“Give me your mouth, Tiny.” Zachary’s eyes were closed, his face creased with pleasure. “Let me taste you while I touch you.”

Impossible to resist such a request. Eve leaned forward, pressing her breasts more firmly into Zachary’s hands and melding her lips to his.

He kissed her so tenderly, Eve forgot to breathe.

Zachary released her mouth only to press heated kisses down her jaw and over her neck. He nuzzled his nose beneath her ear and inhaled deeply.

“You smell so good. Better than a garden full of roses.”

Eve caught his arms, ran her hands over his biceps and beneath the sleeves of his T-shirt, confirming what she’d suspected all along. Now that she’d touched him, she never wanted to let go. She itched to run her hands all over his arms, his shoulders, his chest.

It was her turn to remove his shirt, and he released her to help shrug it off. As soon as the shirt hit the floor, Eve leaned in even closer, molding her breasts to the shape of his chest, hiding her scar with his body, imbibing the sensation of flesh against flesh.

The man was ripped. Abs of steel. Arms the same. Yet his skin was almost satiny smooth beneath the light sprinkle of hair that covered his chest and forearms.

“Zachary?”

He ran his hands down the length of her back, slowly, seductively. “Mmm?”

“We have a problem.”

“We do?”

“We do,” she whispered against his shoulder. “You know how you liked the fact that I wasn’t trying to get you into bed?”

“Yeah?” He lifted her hair away from her back and planted a warm kiss on her neck.

“Please, don’t hate me for saying this, but…but…getting you into bed is about the only thing I can think of right now.” Her skin was covered in goose flesh, her nipples were tight beads and her pussy was slick with need.

“Jesus!” Zachary growled, pulling away from her. “Thank fucking God for small miracles.”

He was carrying her again.

This time it wasn’t because he doubted Eve’s ability to walk. He simply doubted her ability to get them into the bedroom fast enough.

If Eve had hesitated even a second getting off that table, he’d have fucked her on top of it. Just pushed her back, stripped them of their jeans and fucked her, right there.

But instinct told Zachary Eve wasn’t about a fast fuck on a handy surface. She was a woman to be appreciated. A treasure to be loved leisurely for hours and hours and hours.

But just because he aimed to spend the rest of the night loving her, discovering her body, tasting every inch of her skin, didn’t mean he could wait to get her naked.

Even the sixty-odd feet to the bedroom was hell. Thankfully the bed was now close enough to lay her down on it. Lay her down and whip off her white jeans. Get them as far away from her legs as he could toss them.

Fuck, he wanted this woman. Wanted her like he’d never wanted anyone.

Yeah, six months of abstinence played a role in his desperation, but with Eve it went way beyond the simple need to fuck. Something about her, something inexplicable had him hooked. It also had him feeling…protective.

She’d been hurt. Badly. And God help him, he never wanted her to experience pain again.

He took maybe half a second to appreciate her panties, then whipped those off too, almost forgetting to breathe when she lay naked on his bed.

He couldn’t take her scar away, couldn’t reverse the damage that had been done. But that didn’t mean she wasn’t the most beautiful woman he’d ever laid eyes on. Didn’t mean she didn’t taste like every fantasy he’d ever had, or feel better than the finest silk money could buy.

Silky, soft, slick.

Fu-uck! She tasted good.

“Zachary.” Eve squealed his name. Not a loud squeal. Not even a high-pitched one. Just a yelp that made his balls draw tight and his cock stiffen uncomfortably.

“Mm?” He couldn’t talk. His mouth was full, his tongue busy. He’d buried his head between Eve’s legs and greedily helped himself to a serving of her pussy.

“That’s… You—! Oh, God.”

She gave up trying to form coherent sentences and bent her legs, spreading her thighs as creamed honey spilled on his tongue and spurred something primal in his chest.

Yeah, he lapped at her hungrily, loving the way her clit swelled against his lips and her slick folds invited deeper exploration. But he wanted more. He wanted everything from her. Zachary had an unshakable desire to stake his claim on her body and make her his, wholly and completely.

The idea of sliding his dick home, of burying himself in her heat and becoming one with her did crazy things to his blood pressure.

The physical side of his need he could comprehend. Feverish lust gripped him, throwing him headfirst into an unexpected infatuation with the gorgeous makeup artist. The emotional side he couldn’t. In his wildest fantasies he hadn’t imagined himself craving the company and the taste of any woman other than his redheaded destiny.

But Eve. Jesus, Eve was changing all the rules, changing the game. Zachary couldn’t even focus on the redhead with any clarity. Didn’t want to. Not while his mouth covered the most intimate, most secret, most delicious part of this tiny woman.

He lost himself to the flavor of her passion. Creamy. Sweet. A little salty. Her pussy had just hit number one on his list of temptations. A man could grow addicted to her taste. One lick would never be enough. Perhaps a sample once a day for the rest of his life might work. Okay, twice a day. Three times even.

It’d be worth it. Her essence could replace food. It would sustain him. Nourish him.

He stopped thinking and gave himself over to the gratification of licking her. Sucking on her clit. Kissing her pussy. Gorging on her.

Take your time, Zachary. Appreciate what you have before you.

Fuck, it was impossible. He couldn’t go slow, couldn’t take his time. He just needed to taste her. All of her. Make her scream with raw need. Rake her nails down his back with blistering desire. Make her come on his tongue, over and over again.

Eve writhed on the bed, shivers rippling up her legs, making them quiver against his arms.

He loved it. Grew fucking high on her response, her taste.

He placed his hands beneath her ass, filled his palms with two firm butt cheeks and lifted her higher so he could worship more of her.

He flattened his tongue against her slit and licked her from her pussy lips to her clit and back down again.

Eve squealed. Her nails dug into his shoulders and she pushed her groin harder against her mouth.

Zachary licked her again and again, loving the warmth beneath his tongue, the slick heat, the tight nub, the way her shivering increased until she trembled against his face.

And still he licked steadily, squeezing her buttocks, heady from her scent and her reaction.

“Oh, God…Zachary. I’m going to… Can’t stop. I…I! Oh, God. Oh, my fucking God.”

Ah, Jesus. He wasn’t sure he could survive this. Wasn’t sure he could escape her release unscathed. Already she’d reached a part of him he’d never let a woman reach before. If she gave him everything, he might be forced to return her gift—with his heart.

She convulsed around him, her pussy spasming beneath his tongue. A fresh burst of liquid heat spilled over his tongue as she came, her cries echoing through his ears.

He’d been wrong. He could survive this, survive her rapture, her release—so long as he survived it a millions items over. In fact, now that he’d witnessed her breaking around him, he wasn’t sure he’d survive without it.

But as her convulsions and trembling eased, a sense of arrogant smugness seized him. He’d done this to her. He’d brought her to this peak.

Not enough. Not even close to enough.

He needed to see her overwhelmed again—overwhelmed and coming on his tongue. Now.

Zachary flipped her over. Just rolled her from her back to her stomach and bit her on the ass, hard enough to leave a tingle but not a mark.

She gave a breathy laugh, and a fresh wave of blood hit his dick.

“Climb onto your knees.”

Eve tried. He could see the effort she made, but her legs were shaky and she flopped down on the bed with another breathless laugh.

Jesus, Zachary burned to bury himself deep, deep, deep inside her.

Instead he lifted her to her knees, supporting her before she collapsed again and urged her to lean forward so she was stretched out before him, her ass in the air, her breasts and shoulders resting on the bed.

Her pussy glistened, pink and puffy and perfect, wet from her juices and his tongue. Again he buried his head between her thighs and feasted.

He palmed her buttocks, kneading the flesh as he dipped his tongue inside her slit, fucking her with it.

She gasped and twisted. “Can’t. No…please. Too sensitive.” But even as she spoke she relaxed against him, letting him dip his tongue inside her once more. “God, Zachary.” Her voice was muffled against the sheets. “What are you doing to me?”

Whatever he could. This was just the beginning.

Zachary feasted on her. Like a starving man he lapped and laved, nibbled and nipped, kissed and sucked. He let one finger trail over the curve of her ass and lightly tickled her hole.

Eve jerked violently. Her moans reverberated through his ears and down his back. He slid his free hand around her hip and fingered her clit.

She broke on his tongue with a low yelp.

Her juices wet his lips and slid down his chin and he simply continued to lick her, caressing her clit as she came.

It was only when she collapsed forward, squeezing her thighs shut, that Zachary ceased his torture. He tore himself off the bed, racing to the bathroom. Yeah, he’d sworn off sex, but he wasn’t a complete idiot. He always carried protection.

He was back in less than a minute, his jeans gone, his cock sheathed—and extra condoms in hand—and his chest ripped wide open, exposing his heart. She’d done it. Eve. She’d shredded his defenses, left his restraint in a pile backstage at the concert.

She hadn’t moved. She lay exactly as he’d left her, naked on the bed, her thighs slightly parted, her ass exposed and her arms stretched in front of her.

How easy it would be to kneel between her legs, mount her, take her from behind. How fucking incredible it would be.

But when Zachary finally sank inside her, he intended to look into Eve’s eyes and let her see every emotion she brought out in him. That way she could understand how fucking much he wanted her.

She’d also realize her scar was no repellent. Eve was perfect just the way she was. If he took her from behind this first time, her fears would in no way be allayed. The action would probably just convince her she’d been right in thinking her mark hideous.

It wasn’t. It horrified him only because of the trauma she must have had to endure. One day soon, he’d ask her more about the scar. Ask her exactly how she’d gotten it. Just not now.

“Eve?”

She rolled her head languidly to the side to peer at him through dreamy eyes. “Mm?” It was a contented rumble of an answer.

“You feel good?”

“Mmm.” She practically purred her response.

“Wanna feel even better?”

“Not possible,” she murmured, making him grin.

Zachary took a step closer, and her gaze landed on his erection. To his untold satisfaction, she squirmed on the bed.

“Definitely possible,” was his whispered response. He stroked his hand down her spine and watched as goose bumps erupted over her skin. “Roll over, Tiny.”

She did, taking her sweet time about it. Her hair was a wild mess, her neck and cheeks flushed with pleasure and her breasts swollen and magnificent. “You gonna fuck me now, Jonah?”

“Do you want Jonah to fuck you now?”

Eve stared at his cock before lifting her gaze to meet his. “No.”

His heart sank. “No?”

“Not Jonah. I want Zachary.”

He growled. “You have Zachary.” Christ, she had more of him than she bargained for, since his heart was fast becoming hers. “But he’s not gonna fuck you.”

Her eyes widened, distress turning her irises a dark blue, and her arm covered her torso, from her breastbone to her shoulder, exactly where her scar lay. Her other hand trailed shakily over her cheek.

Zachary climbed on the bed and knelt between her legs. “He’s not gonna fuck you because he—I—am going to take my time making love to you.” He leaned over, wrapped his hands around each of her wrists and pulled her arms up and over her head.

No fucking way was she concealing herself from him. Not any part of her.

A soft sigh of relief left her lips.

“Don’t hide from me, Eve.” He ran his fingers from each of her shoulders, down across her breasts and let his hands meet on her breastbone. “Don’t hide any part of yourself. There’s no need. You’re beautiful just the way you are.”

And there they were again. The damn tears in her eyes.

Zachary couldn’t stand them, couldn’t bear to see them, not if it meant Eve was hurting. He did the only thing he could think of to stop them. He leaned in and pressed his mouth to hers.

The kiss hit fever pitch the second their lips touched and their tongues tangled. This time the fireworks Zachary saw had nothing to do with flashes and public displays of affection.

Uh-uh, this time the fireworks were compliments of the intense heat that burned between him and Eve.

Chapter Six

Twice.

She’d just climaxed twice and still she wanted more. She wanted to come again, this time wrapped around Zachary, his cock inside her, his mouth on hers.

God knew, she should worry about her scars, the ones he hadn’t seen, the ones he unwittingly demanded she reveal, but she couldn’t focus on them now. Couldn’t focus on anything beside the delicious assault of his mouth, the naked body that covered hers, the hard shaft that pressed against her thigh, separated from her bare flesh by a slip of latex.

She twisted this way then that, trying desperately to get to that hard shaft, to let it slide between her legs, push inside her…

But Zachary was having none of it. Instead of giving in to her insistent moans and silent demands, he released her lips to dip his head lower and subject her breasts to the same exquisite torture he’d subjected her pussy to.

He kissed them and suckled them, nipped them and nibbled them, whispering sensual words against her skin. He traced the scar with his lips and then with his tongue, leaving a burning trail of fire in his wake. By the time he lifted his head to look at her with passion-drunk eyes, she’d forgotten she had a scar.

She knew only this man, his sinful mouth, his skilled hands and his silver tongue.

“Zachary?”

“Mm?”

“Make love to me.”

“Mmm…” The rest of his purred response was cut off as he claimed her mouth again. He finally, finally arched his back, rocked his hips and let his cock slide between her legs.

Eve gripped his thighs with hers, opening herself as wide as she could to his invasion. Her eyes slid shut. It was like she’d waited her entire life for this moment, for this joining.

When the tip of his shaft finally touched the lips of her pussy, when her muscles gave way to his insistent yet gentle probing, every nerve ending leapt to life.

This, him, Zachary was all she wanted, all she needed. All she desired.

Could he be all she’d ever desired?

A long sigh shuddered from her mouth, and for once everything was right in the world. The past and scars and masks melted into insignificance, and the moment melded into a little piece of perfect.

Eve murmured his name, a soft hum that floated between them. She leaned in and bit his neck, a sneaky nibble just above his collarbone.

Zachary froze. And growled. A low, primal sound, echoing frustration, longing and compulsion. With an almost violent twist, he pulled out of her only to plunge all the way back in, burying himself inside her.

Deep, deep inside her. Filling her. Claiming her.

“Ah, fuck!” His cry bounced off the walls. “Eve.”

She clutched his arms, ran her hands over his shoulders, slid them over his back, gloried in the contained strength in his muscles.

Zachary dragged his cock out and drove it back in. The raw pleasure of his thrusts blinded her. He drove into her again and then again. Once, twice, forty times, each one more wanton, more wicked than before.

Time stopped. The world ceased spinning.

God, he felt good. Inside and out. Solid man. Solid muscle. Pure temptation. Unadulterated rapture. “Don’t stop,” she gasped. “Please, God, don’t ever stop.”

“Can’t,” he gasped. “Won’t.”

He shifted his weight on his arms, lifting himself a little higher, changing the angle of penetration, and rocked above her, burying himself inside her deeper than before.

That was all it took. One second Eve climbed high on a wave, part of a stunning ride, and the next she crested it, flying over the top as sensation exploded within.

She threw her head back, arched her spine and gave herself up to the blissful tide that took her beyond the edge of reason.

Colors flared behind her eyelids as her pussy convulsed, her inner muscles grabbing at his driving cock while a billion pulses of heaven blazed through her.

“Eve, Ah… Fuck. Tiny!” And then he too slipped over, plunging into her one last time before every muscle in his body tensed.

He came with a roar, buried so deep inside her she lost all track of where she ended and he began. So deep inside her that the contractions in his cock as he came triggered fresh waves of bliss in her.

Endless minutes passed as time spluttered back to life, as the world slowly began to spin again. Eve tried to get her heart beating normally, tried to find a rhythm in her breathing slower than a hurricane.

She lost herself to the delicious weight of the man who’d collapsed on top of her, panting. Eve herself was buoyant, floating in a nirvana of Zachary’s making. Of being adored. Of feeling cherished.

When he slipped out of her pussy with a groan and a shudder, Eve shivered as a last ripple of sweetness flowed through her.

He hauled himself reluctantly off the bed, pausing to place a wonderfully decadent kiss on her lips. “I’ll be right back.”

Zachary disappeared into the bathroom, leaving Eve to catch her breath, to wonder at everything that had gone down. To marvel at how trusting she’d been with him. She’d shown him the scar on her chest.

When last had a man inspired such faith?

Never.

She caught her hands above her head and stretched, extending every muscle from her calves to her fingers. Then she relaxed, falling back onto the mattress and letting the luxurious post-orgasmic lethargy flow through her.

Zachary returned, inspiring a ridiculously large smile from Eve.

“You look happy.” He returned her smile.

“I am, Zachary. Like really, really happy.”

He climbed onto the bed beside her, tugging her into his arms. “Ah, Tiny. Me too.” He ran his hand over her back. “Would you believe me if I told you I’ve never come that hard?” This said with a ragged breath.

Eve could identify. Not only had she just had the climax of a lifetime, she’d had it after two other spectacular orgasms. She felt wonderfully sated. “You have me wrapped around your little finger. I’d believe anything you told me now.”

“So long as you know I’m not just feeding you a line. Seriously, that was about the best sex I’ve ever had.”

She tried to play it cool. “You’ve obviously never had sex with an Australian before.”

Zachary stilled.

His hesitation took her by surprise. “Oh, Lord.” She pushed against his chest so she could get a look at his face. “You have had sex with an Aussie before?”

He cringed. “Well, uh, kinda.”

“Kinda?”

“Kinda…as in yeah.” He closed his eyes and fell back against the pillow. “I’ve had sex with a lot of people, Eve. From a lot of places. Some of them were from Australia.”

“Some of them?” she squeaked. “How many were there?” She stared at him, reminded all over again that it wasn’t just Zachary Pace she’d slept with. It was Jonah Speed too. The legendary Jonah Speed. The smolderingly sexy Jonah Speed.

Lost in the throes of spectacular sex, she’d forgotten that little detail.

Suddenly the sex didn’t seem quite so spectacular. Suddenly she didn’t feel quite as special and cherished as she had two minutes before.

Eve wished she hadn’t asked her last question. She wasn’t sure she wanted to know. Feeling naked and vulnerable, she sat up to look for her clothes but didn’t get very far. He grabbed her arms, pulling her back down so they once again lay face to face. Zachary cupped her cheek so gently, Eve forgot to shake his hand off. She forgot to breathe too.

“Eve.” He held her gaze. “I’ve slept with hundreds of women. I can’t hide from that, can’t pretend I haven’t. It’s part of who I am…or rather, who I was. And yeah, some of those people were Australian. But—” his voice softened, “—but I can promise you that before tonight I have never made love to an Australian.” His eyelids drooped sensually. “Never wanted to…until I met you.”

Something in her chest lurched. “Zachary…” She couldn’t finish. Didn’t know what to say.

“What we did together? That wasn’t just sex. Not by a long stretch of the imagination.”

And just like that, he put the spectacular back into their sex.

She smiled at him. “We hardly know each other. How could we possibly have made love?”

“Lady, you’ve seen inside my head. You’ve lived through an experience that changed my life. How could you possibly say you hardly know me?”

“I experienced a child’s emotions. You’re a man now. It’s different.”

He laughed, a hoarse, soft chuckle. “Yeah? Well it was the man who made love to you. The man who tasted you. Who lost control inside you. The man who ripped himself wide open, showing you his soul as he came.”

Damn it, this man was dangerous to her heart. “Be careful, Mr. Pace. Carry on talking like this, and I might not let your red-haired future anywhere near you when she finally makes an appearance.”

Zachary blinked, and his eyes creased with displeasure. “Can you please not do that?”

“What? Keep her from you? Uh, I think we both know that would be impossible anyway, what with her being your destiny and all.”

“No. I mean can you please not keep bringing her up?”

“Uh…”

“She might be my future, Eve, but this is my present. And it’s a present that’s all wrapped up in you. I’m with you. The last thing I want to do is think about another woman.”

Stunned by his words, she placed her hand between her breasts, over the edge of her scar, and rubbed.

His concern was instant. “Does it hurt?”

“No.” Not anymore anyway. “It’s not that. It’s just… It’s just that every time you say something like that, like…like you’re all wrapped up in me, my chest feels funny. It’s as if my heart forgets how to beat properly.”

His eyes twinkled. “Is that a bad thing?”

“You make my heart skip a beat. Often. You tell me if it’s a bad thing.”

He took her hand from her chest and threaded his fingers through hers. “It’s the best thing I’ve heard in months.”

He said something else, but Eve didn’t hear him.

Her hand tingled. Electricity shot through her arm. Spots danced in front of her eyes as the world around her darkened.

Bam!

A punch of desire hit her in the stomach, so fierce it took her breath.

Want her, she thought. Want her so bad I can’t stand not to touch her.

That wasn’t her thought. Wasn’t her desire. It was Zachary’s. Adult Zachary’s.

Wanna sit back on my throne and haul her with me.

The adult Zachary stared across the backstage chaos, focusing all his attention on the beguiling makeup artist.

Wanna strip every stitch of clothing from her body, pull her onto my lap and let her take us for the ride of our lives.

He narrowed his eyes, watched her, didn’t take his gaze off her. Couldn’t.

Everything went black. The tingles ceased. So did the electricity.

“…so fucking stupid of me.”

Her hand was free.

“Eve, baby, come back to me.”

She opened her eyes and found herself lying on her back with Zachary kneeling over her, his hands in her hair, holding her head up.

The zing of Zachary’s acute desire left her heart pounding and her breath uneven. A low-grade ache pulsed in her pussy.

“Ah, fuck. Thank you, God.” His eyes danced with panic. “You okay, Tiny? You back here with me?”

“I’m okay.” Her voice was a soft murmur. She couldn’t manage more than that.

“Dizzy?”

“Mm. Yeah. Just gonna lie here a while.”

Gently he laid her head on a pillow.

“Take your time. Get your bearings.” His hands feathered over her hair. “I lost you for a minute there.”

She lifted her hand, intending to show him why, but her arm was heavy as a concrete slab and fell back to her side uselessly.

“I know, I know. I tried to hold your hand.” His tone was apologetic, worried. “Wasn’t thinking. I’m an idiot.”

“You’re not an idiot. It felt nice.”

“I thought so too, ’til you zoned out on me. I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be. It happens.” She closed her eyes, rested a moment. “Zachary?”

“Yeah?”

“I’ve never heard of a throne before.”

“A throne?”

“Yeah. Your drummer stool.”

“You saw my throne now?” He sounded confused.

“Uh, not really. I saw you thinking about your throne.” Well, technically, she hadn’t seen him. She’d been him.

He snorted. “There’s an awe-inspiring vision for you. Me, thinking about a seat.”

“It was awe-inspiring.” She let a self-satisfied grin tug at her lips and opened her eyes. Better. Not so dizzy anymore. “You were imagining me, naked, riding you while you sat on your throne.”

“Ah. Right.” He had the grace to blush. “Yeah. Um, that would have been earlier. After the concert.”

“I’m flattered.” She was. And still turned on—a stunning achievement considering Zachary had just made her come three times. “But the whole doing-it-in-front-of-twenty-thousand-people thing? Yeah, not gonna happen. Ever.”

It was his turn to grin. “How about the whole doing it on my stool thing?”

“Onstage?”

“There are drums in this suite. Complete with a throne and drumsticks. Private as it can get.”

“Tempting though it sounds, I have no coordination whatsoever. If I even tried something like that, I’d likely fall on my ass before I ever had the opportunity to ride you.”

“Have faith.” He winked. “I’d never let you fall. And just wait ’til you see what I can do with a pair of drumsticks…”

The laughter pealed out of her. “Oh, I can only imagine.”

He smiled with her. “You feeling better?”

“I am.”

“You mad at me?”

“For what?”

“Holding your hand.”

“No.”

“How about fantasizing about you at a live concert?”

“I’m flattered.” Beyond words, actually. “Uh, are you mad at me?”

“For what?”

“Slipping into your head—again.”

“Not mad at all. Just surprised. Again. Can you sit up?” He shifted back, giving her space.

Eve straightened up slowly, just in case another wave of giddiness hit. It didn’t. This vision had been much quicker than the last.

“I’ll get you a drink. Water? Something sweeter.”

“No, nothing, thanks, I’m good. But if you can hand me my panties and jeans, I can start getting dressed.”

Zachary didn’t move. “Dressed?”

“Yeah, you know. When you put your clothes on so you’re no longer naked.”

“I like you naked.”

Her gaze raked over his scrumptious body. “I like you naked too. But walking from your room to mine without clothes probably isn’t the wisest decision.”

He spread his hands in question. “Why would you want to walk to your room?”

“Oh, I don’t know. To sleep maybe?”

Zachary looked at her pointedly. “Is there a problem with this bed? I’ve slept in it just fine the last few nights.”

“Not at all. It’s a very comfortable bed. Big too.” Way bigger than the one in her room. “But it’s your bed, not mine.” And there was not a chance in hell she would sleep in his bed, with him.

“And so?”

“And so if I stay in it any longer, we both know neither of us will get any sleep. Especially now that I know how you felt about me after the concert.”

He raised an eyebrow. “You know how I felt?”

“I was you, remember?”

“Describe it.” His voice dropped, his tone lower than usual. Sexier. It rippled down her spine. “In detail.”

She bit her lip. That could get embarrassing. “Uh…you sure you wanna hear?”

“Very sure.”

“Okay.” She closed her eyes, remembering. “I felt like I’d been punched in the chest.” She smacked her chest for emphasis. “With a wallop of desire so powerful it smashed the breath from my lungs.”

“That’s how I feel every time I look at you.” His voice was even deeper, a gruff murmur that turned Eve’s insides to liquid.

She swallowed. “My body tightened.” There was no other way to put it. “Every muscle seemed, I don’t know, aware, alert. I needed…contact. Had to touch you. Er, me. Had to feel your—my—bare skin, flesh against flesh.”

She knew she was confusing her pronouns, but Zachary’s feelings mirrored hers so perfectly, it was tough to differentiate whether she spoke about herself or him.

Blood raced to her cheeks then, and she knew she was blushing. “Oh, God, who am I kidding? You just wanted to fuck me. Kind of like I just want you to fuck me now.”

He took her down with a primal growl. Pinned her to the bed with his massive shoulders, strong legs and erect dick. And he kissed her. Crushed his lips to hers, demanding she surrender everything to him. Her mouth, her pussy, her body, her heart. Her soul.

“Still wanna fuck you, Tiny. Want your naked flesh against mine. Want the contact. Want the loving. Want it now.”

He kissed her again, and she gave him everything he demanded. Willingly. And faster than she’d ever have believed possible. One minute she was preparing to leave, the next she was on her back, frantic to have him inside her again. Desperate to fuck him like he’d wanted to fuck her. Then. Before they’d met.

She clawed at his shoulders, slammed her body against his. Zachary may have wanted to make love to her earlier, but this, now, this urgent craving for satisfaction was all about raw desperation. Violent need. It was about instant gratification.

She ripped her mouth from his, arched her back and thrust her hips up. “Do it, Zachary. Do it now. Fuck me.”

Her pussy touched the tip of his cock and she twisted, spreading her legs, trying to get him inside.

He jumped off her with a frustrated shout.

His chest heaved, his cock throbbed against his stomach and the tendons in his shoulders and neck stuck out from vicious self-restraint. Zachary tried to speak, tried to say something, but gave up. He grabbed his cock, squeezing it, and clenched his teeth together, a look of agony on his face.

With his other hand he reached for the table beside the bed, finding a condom.

Ah, God. Lucky he’d been thinking logically enough to remember protection. The thought hadn’t even crossed her mind.

He ripped the packet open with his teeth and seemed to gain a modicum of control. “This time you ride me.” His gaze trapped hers as he rolled the condom over his shaft. “Wanna watch you, wanna see you come.”

Eve’s control, on the other hand, was gone. His demands left it in a pile on the floor.

She jumped him.

Just threw herself at the man, knocking them both backwards. His instincts impressed her. He caught her as they went over, crashing to the floor, cushioning her fall.

Where she found the physical strength to knock back over six feet of solid muscle, she had no idea. She just appreciated the fluid grace of his reflexes and the care he took to protect her. It turned her on even more. Fed her hunger.

She couldn’t climb on top of him fast enough, couldn’t fling her leg over his waist with the same agility he’d used to catch her. But then it seemed he couldn’t get her on top of him quickly enough. He grabbed her waist, lifted her up and slammed her back down.

Too hurried. There was no synchronization.

She missed her target. Instead of impaling herself on his cock, she flattened it, and then almost wept as she slipped over his length, her slick pussy and clit caressed by the satiny steel of his erection.

God, he felt so good.

His choked moan had her raising her hips again. Had her grabbing his dick behind her back and holding it in place. This time when he lifted her, the urgency was still there, but he guided her down more carefully, took a little longer, so when the tip of his shaft touched her pussy lips, she could center herself, center him, and slide down onto him, around him. Envelop him.

Sensation careened through her veins, intoxicating in its speed and strength.

Thick and long, he filled her. She leaned forward, accommodating him better, and the action inside brought a fierce groan to her throat.

“Jesus. You are perfect. Fucking perfect.” He began to move her, lifting her up by the waist and guiding her back down, rocking her over his dick, on it, fucking himself with her body.

Instinctively she tried to hasten his pace, fuck him harder, faster.

But unlike her, their joining seemed to have calmed the beast in him. Instead of the frenzied man who’d been desperate to get her on his dick, Zachary became the attentive lover, the man concerned only with her pleasure and his.

His fingers drummed against her hips as he rocked her, back and forth, up and down.

The deluge of pleasure was so intense it took a while to realize he moved her to a beat he must have heard in his head. It wasn’t just mindless sex. It was the slow, tantalizing rhythm of a tune she’d never heard before.

A throbbing, concentrated beat that swept through her as his fingers tapped, as he rocked her in time with those fingers. And then she caught the tempo, felt it deep inside her chest, like music playing through her.

She rocked in time with it, rising and falling on his dick as though they danced together to a favorite song.

Zachary watched her, his gaze never leaving her face as she found his rhythm and joined it. As she danced to his song. His mouth softened in a smile even as his gaze held hers.

His hands wandered, leaving her waist and finding her breasts, cupping them, strumming them, tapping out the beat on her nipples and around.

Eve thought for sure she’d found heaven. Landed there when Zachary plunged inside her. But when he began to hum in that rich baritone of his, harmonizing his voice with the tap of his fingers and the rocking of her body, she knew she’d been mistaken.

Heaven could only be complete when Zachary offered everything of himself. His rhythm, his beat, his body, his voice. His heart.

Because she saw it, sitting there, in the depths of his green eyes.

She closed her eyes and let her head fall back. His voice became a seductive whisper. She felt it like an internal caress just as she felt his hands stroking her chest.

What had begun as a wild ride—a forceful need to fuck—transformed into something very, very different. Something beautiful, unique. Something she’d shared with no one but Zachary, and she knew, deep in her heart, he’d be the only man she could ever share this rhythm with.

They swayed together for an eternity, Zachary humming, a wordless song meant just for her. And him. His voice crept along her skin, igniting every inch of her flesh. Her heart beat in time with his music. Her urgency dissipated in the beauty of their physical harmony.

She simply felt. Experienced the magnificence that was Zachary, became one with him.

Until he upped the ante. Changed the beat.

Zachary dropped one hand to her pussy, and just like his left hand tapped the tempo on her breast, his right tapped her clit. Just a finger. It was all he needed.

Sensation skittered up her spine and down again.

Liquid heat pooled afresh between her legs.

She opened her eyes, stared at him, and the naked heat, the raw passion in his gaze almost slayed her.

His song became too slow—she couldn’t keep to his pace. Not when his finger strummed, seduced, delighted. Not when every ounce of her awareness now focused on the small, swollen nub he played, and the inner muscles riding his shaft.

Eve rocked harder, losing the beat.

Zachary tapped faster, increasing the cadence. The song kept the same tune, only he played it with a different tempo, a faster one. Faster, then faster still, Zachary timing his taps with Eve’s wild rocking. He hummed a little quicker, his voice just as deep, just as beautiful as before, only now it was louder, echoing through her ears, down to her breasts.

Sensation built. She couldn’t hold it back much longer. Didn’t want to.

“Z-Zachary—”

The provocative hum stopped, transformed instead into a rapturous groan.

“Z-Zac…” She couldn’t speak.

The tempo against her clit picked up. And then she wasn’t the only one rocking. Zachary’s hips surged up, driving himself into her, deeper, harder, faster, filling her.

Harder, faster still.

Eve couldn’t keep up, stopped trying. The music in her mind played louder. Orchestras joined the drumbeat. Violins, trumpets, cellos. She heard them all. Felt them in every cell of her body.

“Oh, fuck, Eve.” Zachary lost it. The beat vanished as he surged up one final time and roared.

She watched, almost transfixed, as he came, every muscle in his body rippling with his release, a study in perfect male beauty.

And then she couldn’t watch anymore, couldn’t focus. The beat took her, sending her over the edge. She came in an exquisite rush of music and pleasure. Came as Zachary emptied himself inside her.

Came to the sound of violins playing and drums crashing.

And when it was over, and the last notes of the song had finally filtered away, she collapsed on top of him, their rapid panting the only sound that filled the now silent, sated room.

Chapter Seven

The persistent, annoying ringing of her phone woke her.

“’Lo?” Her voice was hoarse and raspy, but seriously, what did the caller expect, forcing her out of her dream world like that?

“Evie!” The shrill scream had her bolting upright.

“What? What’s wrong?”

“Oh, my God. You kissed him. You kissed Jonah Speed!”

The words hit home, jerking her fully awake. “Bree?”

She looked around, orienting herself. Hotel room. 7:43 a.m. Early. Way too early for someone who’d found her bed less than three hours ago.

“Details, Eve. I want every detail, right now. And don’t leave out one thing. Not even one word of any conversation you had with him. Holy shit. My little sister kissed Jonah Speed.”

Eve dragged a stunned hand over her eye and down her cheek. “What the…? Wait, Bree, how do you know?” Nothing like a little early morning madness from Briana to get her heart racing like the devil.

“How do I know? How do I know? The whole world freaking knows. It’s only in every newspaper in Queensland. In color. Full-color photos of you and Jonah Speed, pashing your little hearts out.”

She gasped. “In the newspaper?”

Bree was silent for a long second. When she spoke again her voice was more serious. “Uh-huh. In print and online. The Courier Mail, the Australian, news.com.au, smh.com.au.”

Eve shoved a hand through her wild hair. A knot of panic and unease built in her belly.

“Bree, take this one step at a time and tell me what you’re talking about. In detail.”

The air was perfumed with roses, but their sweet scent did nothing to settle her.

Roses. From Jonah. No…from Zachary. Her heart lurched.

“Okay, so I’m fast asleep, it’s still too early to wake Hannah, and Anthony walks in, newspaper in hand, and shakes me awake, right? ‘You’re gonna wanna see this, Bree,’ he says to me. ‘See what?’ I ask. His answer? ‘Your sister, getting hot and heavy with the drummer from Speed—for all the world to see’.” Bree stopped and took a breath. “And seriously, Evie, there you were. On page one and three of the Courier!”

Eve’s stomach sank. Shit. The pictures. The flashes going off. Hundreds of them. She’d forgotten about them in the aftermath of Zachary’s kiss. What with her vision and the talking and Zachary making love to her, she hadn’t even given the photos another thought.

Stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Jonah had kissed her at the after party in a room crammed full of people, for all and sundry to see—and photograph.

Damn it. Maybe she should have poked Zachary in the eye after all.

Both eyes.

The last thing she wanted or needed was to be in the public eye again. Eve’s specialization was backstage theatrics, in masking the real person, not displaying herself to the whole world.

“S-so it’s in the Courier Mail?” she asked shakily.

“Uh-huh. But…that’s not all. After looking at the articles, I grabbed my iPad and searched news.com.au, and sheesh, Evie, you should see the headlines there. International rock stars Speeding through our Aussie women.”

Eve dropped her head in her hands with a loud groan.

“So it’s true? You really did kiss Jonah Speed?”

Kiss, fuck, make love to… Yeah, it was all true. Not that she said any of that out loud. “You’ve seen the pictures, Bree. You tell me.”

“Uh…”

“Uh…?”

“Not just pictures.”

“What?”

“There’s a video too. That’s how I knew for sure it was you. Someone caught the two of you in a full-on lip lock. Mouths, lips, tongues, hands tangled in hair, the whole caboodle. And after, when Jonah breaks the kiss, there’s a full frontal, of you, looking up at him.”

“Shit.” It was nothing but a whisper.

“It’s not all bad, Evie. You look stunning. I mean seriously gorgeous kind of stunning.”

Eve snorted her disbelief. If anyone knew exactly how Eve looked it was her sister. Not that Bree thought Eve was ugly. Not by a long shot. But she did see the scars for what they were: a permanent reminder of a terrible tragedy.

Although she didn’t agree with Eve, Bree had always understood her reluctance to show her real face in public. As a result, it was Bree who’d persuaded her to explore her talents with a makeup brush, who’d encourage her to experiment with different brands, colors and techniques until finally Eve had felt confident enough to be seen in public.

“Jonah also looks hot,” Bree went on, ignoring the derisive snort. “Seriously, fire-raging, inferno-burning hot. And the look’s not because he’s the hottest man on earth—which is an undisputed fact, by the way. It’s because he’s looking at you as though he’d like to eat you for freaking breakfast. His lips are swollen and pouty, his cheeks are flushed, his eyes heavy-lidded. Jeez, Eve, he looks like you’ve just given him a BJ.”

“Bree!”

“Did you?”

“Did I what?”

“Give him a BJ?”

“At a freaking after party? In front of all those people? Are you nuts?”

“Not at the party. He hauled you away from there. Ran with you. Anything could have happened then. Anything. Including a BJ.”

“Jeez, Bree. For heaven’s sake, think logically about this. I didn’t give him a BJ.” She bit her lip. At least that she could say with all honesty. Because whatever else had happened last night, the one thing that hadn’t was a blowjob.

Bree clicked her tongue. “Well, why not? Seriously, from the look on his face you could have given him anything. Anything at all, and he would have grabbed it gratefully. What stopped you?”

Eve sighed. Nothing. But she wasn’t ready to share those details yet. Not even with her sister, with whom she shared everything. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

“When have I ever not believed you?”

She closed her eyes and lay back down on her pillow. “He held my hand, Bree. Took it in his as he raced us down the passageway.”

“What?”

“Yep. I made it about thirty meters before the vision hit.”

“Oh, shit.” Bree’s entire attitude changed. “Evie, I’m so sorry.”

Eve didn’t respond.

“Was it bad? A big one? Or just a passing flicker of conversation?”

“It was big, Bree. Huge. I got a huge chunk of his past. Something I never should have been privy to.”

Her sister’s sharp intake of breath told Eve she understood. “How did he take it?”

“You know, he was super nice about it. Understanding too. He carried me back to his suite and took care of me while the dizziness passed.”

And my oh my, how he’d taken care of her. He’d taken care of every single inch of her. Several times.

“He sounds like a nice guy.”

“He is. Really, really nice. Like nothing I’d ever imagined a rock star to be.” But then she’d had no idea how she’d imagined a rock star to be. Aloof, remote, arrogant. Or maybe overly confident and very sure of his abilities to seduce women.

Because, face it. Jonah Speed need only breathe and every woman in the room was instantly seduced.

“Bree?”

“Yeah?”

“He gave me flowers.” She melted at the memory.

“After your vision?”

“Before. After the concert last night.”

“I assume you’d met him before then? In Sydney?”

“Nope. I hadn’t. Then last night he just walked up to me and gave me two roses he’d picked up onstage.” Once again she struck by the craziness of his actions. Why on earth had he homed in on her? Been attracted to her? Her, of all people?

Bree squealed.

Eve quickly filled her in on the dead-and-fresh-rose saga.

“Oh, my God.” Bree’s voice was full of wonder. “Evie, is Jonah Speed falling for you?” Then she coughed. “Or…is he just trying to get my little sister into bed?”

Eve opened her mouth to answer and realized she didn’t know how.

There was no way on earth Jonah—Zachary—could be falling for her. First off, he was Jonah Speed, and world-famous rock stars—world-famous anyones for that matter—just didn’t fall for Eve Andrews.

And even if he did like her, and Eve got a very strong impression that he did, a lot, he still had his red-haired woman to look forward to.

Which logically meant that Zachary only liked Eve enough to get her into bed. And how bad a thing could that be, since Eve liked Zachary more than enough to climb into bed with him?

A mutual “like session”. That’s what she and Zachary had going on. With a ridiculously hot flare of attraction thrown into the pot. And some fantastic sex. Like off-the-charts fantastic sex.

“Can I just say I don’t know and leave it at that for now, Bree?”

“Of course you can, hon. Just tell me one thing. Are you falling for him?” Before Eve could answer, she rushed on. “Because if you are, you had better be careful. He’s a rock star. And not a very private one at that. Criminy, he’s infamous for the number of women he’s slept with. I think he even has a child somewhere back in the States, from one of his many lovers.”

What?

Zachary was a father? Why hadn’t he told her?

Why would he tell her? It had nothing to do with her, nothing to do with anything she’d seen in her vision last night. Nothing to do with anything they’d done together.

“He has a child?”

“There was a huge scandal, a few months back. Didn’t you see it? Some woman claiming Jonah had knocked her up then refused to acknowledge the baby when she came to him for child support.”

Eve frowned. “Hasn’t that story been told about almost every famous person? From Arnold Schwarzenegger to Justin Bieber? Tiger Woods to Mick Jagger?”

“Probably. I just don’t want you to get hurt, Evie.”

What Bree didn’t say, but then she didn’t need to, was the obvious “you’ve been hurt enough already”.

“I’ll be careful. I promise. Listen, I have to go. We’re leaving for the Gold Coast in a few hours and I’ve done nothing to prepare.”

“Okay, I won’t hold you up. Just promise you’ll be careful with him. He plays in a whole different league than you.”

“I know. I know. I will be. Promise.” She changed the subject. “I packed everything I need for the party, by the way. I think Hannah will love my new princess look.”

“Brilliant. She’s so excited about turning four. She can’t wait for her princess aunty to charm all her friends.”

“I’ll do my best. Promise.”

“’Course you will. See you tomorrow.”

“Love you.”

“You too.”

Eve clicked the end button and padded over to the bathroom to shower, wishing her photo had never made headline news.

She paused to stare in the mirror. The cameras hadn’t filmed the real her. Like Zachary, the images hadn’t picked up on the scars on her face which stood out now in stark relief, a lattice of red lines crisscrossed over her left cheek.

Zachary found her attractive and Bree had said she’d looked stunning in the video.

Eve’s laughter filled the bathroom, a hollow, humorless sound. Obviously neither of them was seeing her now. Because the reflection that stared back at Eve was in no way attractive. It was disfigured by thirty-seven hideous marks.

The umpteen scar reduction treatments had allowed her to fully cover those scars with her makeup. But when the foundation came off, there was no hiding the blemishes.

She almost threw herself into the shower. The sooner she washed, the sooner she could arm herself with her protective makeup. Because there was no chance, none at all, that Zachary—or the rest of the world for that matter—would be seeing her without that mask.

Chapter Eight

“I wish you’d stayed the night.” Zachary’d barely shut Eve’s door when he grabbed her by the waist, pulling her against him. “Still say we both would have slept better if you’d been with me.”

Without waiting for her reply he dropped his head and kissed her. Took her mouth with his as he’d been aching to do since he woke up.

“Mmm,” she said dreamily when they drew apart. “Good morning to you too.”

“Morning, Tiny.” He loosened his hold but only enough so he could step back to admire her gorgeous body. The lapels of her thick terrycloth robe had parted slightly at the front, revealing her pert breasts.

Zachary took a moment to enjoy the visual feast. “Perfect,” he murmured before dragging his gaze back to meet hers.

She jumped, startled. “What the…?” Her mouth fell open and she gaped up at him. “Zachary?” She touched his eyebrow, ran her finger around his eye.

“Ah. Yeah.” She’d noticed his eye color. He shrugged, liking her touch—shocked though it may be. “Maybe I should have said something last night.”

“Maybe. Brown? Is this your real color?”

“It is. The green comes compliments of colored contacts. We all wear them when we’re Speed.”

“You, Jamie and Jordan?”

“Yeah. Me, Jamie and Jordan. Actually, me, Nathan and Seth.”

“Their real names?”

“Uh-huh.”

“So, false names, false eye color. Does it help?”

“With what?”

“Distancing your real selves from the general public.”

Smart woman. The exact reason they’d chosen contacts and stage names. “It does. To a degree.” Nathan had suggested the lenses. Zachary had recommended the color. It was his way of incorporating his future into his present.

“I like your eyes brown.” She hadn’t stopped staring at them. “They’re…softer, warmer. Make you more approachable. And…”

“And?”

“And brown looks good on you.” She shivered and pressed herself against him. “Like really good.”

Zachary growled. “If I’d known you’d like my real color better than the green, I’d have trashed the lenses before you left earlier. Maybe then you wouldn’t have gone.”

“I would have been real tempted to stay,” she confessed. “But, as I said, there was the whole sleep issue, Mr. Pace. We both needed it.”

“I needed you more than I needed sleep.” He grinned at her choice of name. “Ya know, you and I have done it. Had sex,” he added with a stage whisper. “It’s okay to drop the ‘mister’ bit.”

“Okay then…Pace.” She frowned. “Pacey.” She nodded this time.

“Pacey?”

“It’s either Pacey, Speedo or Zacko. And, well, no to Speedo. Just…no. And whacko Zacko sounds too familiar. So Pacey it is.”

“And Zac won’t work?”

“You don’t strike me as a Zac.”

He’d never been a Zac. Had always preferred Zachary.

“Besides, you’re in Australia now. We have to give you an Australian name.”

“And Pacey’s Australian?”

“Sure. In the same way sucking dingo balls is.”

“You Aussies are crazy.”

She grinned. “You’ll learn to love us.”

Zachary suspected she was right. In fact, he might already be just a little in love with her.

He took her mouth in another kiss, this one leaving him panting and aroused. When he pulled away, she melted against him. Melted into him. And lifted her head to kiss him again. A sweet, delicious kiss he felt all the way down to his toes.

She had him aroused and utterly charmed.

Eve smiled when it was over, her lips more pink than red.

No lipstick? The rest of her face was perfectly made up. Hmm, did he prefer the cherry-red look he hadn’t been able to resist last night, or the natural pink of her flesh, which made him want to spread her before him and explore other pink parts of her?

Zachary couldn’t choose. Didn’t try. They both made him hot.

“Zachary?”

“Yeah?”

“Are you a father?”

He stumbled backward, still holding Eve, and had to dance around ungracefully to find his balance. “Jesus. There’s a question you don’t hear every time you kiss a girl.” He dropped his arms and took a step back.

“Shit.” She flushed and smacked her forehead. “That so didn’t come out like I meant it to. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked like that. Shouldn’t put you on the spot. In fact, I shouldn’t have asked at all.”

The woman seemed to have a flair for putting him on the spot. “Why did you?” He already knew the answer though. She’d heard the rumors. Hell, the whole world had heard the rumors.

That didn’t stop the unease from creeping up his spine.

“I…my sister mentioned it this morning.”

“You discussed me with your sister?” Zachary stiffened.

Experience had taught him to be wary. Rumors spread, fast and furious. A quick call to family or friend was all it took for the press to get involved. And when the press got involved private situations became public fodder—most of the time exaggerated beyond recognition.

On the other hand, who was he to criticize a woman for talking to her sister? Didn’t he talk to his brothers about shit that happened in his life? Maybe he should view her conversation as a compliment.

A part of him would feel complimented, he acknowledged, if she hadn’t mentioned the damn baby shit.

“She phoned me to discuss the papers. We spoke.”

Wait. “What papers?”

Her face dropped. “The newspapers.”

Never mind the unease up his spine. His whole body turned cold. “What about the newspapers?”

“Nothing much.” Her gaze wandered over his shoulder. “Just me. With you. On page one—and three—of the Australian morning newspapers. Your tongue in my mouth. Nothing huge. Oh, and maybe a video of us pashing on the Internet.”

Shit.

Damn.

Fuck it all.

“Wait, what? Pashing?”

“Kissing, mate. Frenching. Making out like teenagers.” She fluttered her hand nonchalantly towards the television. “It’s on the telly too. All the news shows are broadcasting it. And there may be a few YouTube videos making the rounds.”

She said it all very calmly, as though it didn’t affect her at all. But her eyes were huge, she couldn’t look at him and darts of panic flashed across her face. Her fingers feathered over her cheek.

“Christ, I’m sorry.” He rubbed a hand over his face. “I didn’t think. Didn’t check the papers or let Luke know.” Of course this was going to happen. He’d known it as soon as he’d worked out what the blinding flashes of light had been when he’d kissed her. He’d just gotten so caught up in Eve that he’d forgotten all about it.

For once he’d met a woman he found more important than his reputation.

The band manager was bound to have seen the papers by now. Watched the broadcasts. He was probably banging on Zachary’s door right now, attempting to initiate damage control.

Zachary hated this shit. Passionately. He’d been burned badly by the press, and had no doubt they were clamoring to burn him again. So long as they got their story, anything they wrote was okay.

Which was why any interviews Zachary now participated in were conducted on his terms. Period.

But regardless of how much he hated them, hated the paparazzi, and no matter how valid his reasons were for hating them, he was used to them. Knew what to expect. Eve had no experience at all. In her shoes, he’d also be nervous.

He grimaced. “I should have realized this would happen. Did realize. I just… Shit, with everything that happened between us, I didn’t give it another thought.” Stupid. Why hadn’t he tried to protect her from this crap?

Because he couldn’t? Because when it came to the media he was just a pawn to be used for another sensational story?

“Did they know who you were?” he asked. “Identify you by name?”

She shook her head.

Okay, so that was good. A lucky break, at least. But it wouldn’t last. If her sister had recognized her, chances were high someone else had too. Any member of the crew could have identified her. Sure, I know her. She’s the makeup artist for Speed’s back-up singers.

Christ, now what? Did he tell her it would probably get worse? That the photos might haunt her for a while? The photos and the video.

Stories were going to fly. Before she knew it, she’d hear she was engaged to Jonah. Or secretly married to him. Maybe preparing for their first child. Or second. The press would scratch up whatever they could about her. Anything in her past she didn’t want known, they’d know about it.

The paparazzi would dog her every move.

Bastards.

Furious, with himself and with the press, he led her to the bed, urging her to sit on it.

She perched on the edge, and he crouched before her.

“Eve, I wish I could say differently. This might take a while to fade from the media. People are going to talk about it for some time.”

She gave a dejected sigh. “Yeah, I kinda figured that out.”

He didn’t want to scare her, but she had to be prepared. “The paparazzi are going to be searching for you. They’ll follow your every move. Bang on your door—and mine—for a photo.”

“Charming.”

She didn’t know the half of it. “The press is going to scratch around in your past, look for any piece of dirt they can dig up on you.”

Eve blanched. Her face turned pale, so white that even beneath her makeup, Zachary could make out her ghostly pallor.

Someone banged on the door.

Eve started, staring at said door in horror.

“No,” he soothed her instantly. “No, that’s not them. They can’t get to you here. Not in the hotel. There’s security posted all over the place.”

Another bang on the door. “Eve? Are you in there?”

Zachary leapt to his feet. Thank God. Not a moment to soon. He let Luke in.

“Thought I might find you here,” his buddy said in greeting.

“Luke.” Zachary knew his voice reflected his relief.

“Dry spell over?” his friend asked, a hint of amusement in his voice, although his eyes were dead serious.

“You noticed.”

“The whole world noticed.” Luke chuckled. “No small measures for you. When you break the shackles of your self-restraint, you do it in style. In front of an audience of hundreds. Millions.”

Zachary grimaced.

“We’ll deal with it. We’ll get through it. Just like we’ve gotten through other crises.” Luke’s hand on his shoulder was comforting. Or it should have been, if his knuckles didn’t look bruised and raw. His whole hand was swollen. Both his hands were.

“Jesus, Luke, what the—?”

Luke dropped his hand. “It’s nothing. I’m fine. An incident while training last night.”

Zachary searched has face. Luke looked okay. He looked…happy? No, “content” would be a better word. “You sure?”

“Yeah, I’m sure.” He smiled then, a smile Zachary had never seen on his friend’s face.

And just like that, he knew. Seth had finally worn Luke down. Finally got him to commit. Fuck knew he’d only been trying for eight years.

Way to go, little brother.

He grinned at Luke, forgetting, for just a moment, that Luke’s hands were damaged and that the press was trying to rip his life apart. Again. His life and Eve’s. “So, you and Seth finally—”

Luke held his hand up in warning. “Don’t say it. Don’t even go there. And I swear if I hear the words I told you so, I will snap every one of your drumsticks in half.”

“Not saying a word here. It’s about damn time, but I’m not saying a word.”

Luke grunted.

Zachary turned to Eve. “Just for the record? I did tell him so. Often.”

“Tell him what?” Eve asked, confused.

“That it’s okay to be happy,” Luke offered. “But I’m not here to talk about me. I’m here to discuss the two of you. You doing okay, Eve?” He sat beside her on the bed, his expression gentle, his voice soft. The man was genuinely concerned about the effect this would have on her.

She nodded, still pale.

“You’ve seen the papers this morning?”

“Half the world has seen the papers.”

“Look, I can’t promise this’ll blow over any time soon. The paparazzi have been thrown a bone, and they’re going to pick at it until there’s nothing left. Or until they find a bigger story. Unfortunately, for now, Speed is their biggest story.” He motioned to the window. “There are reporters camped outside the hotel. I’m sorry to say they want a piece of you. Even more than usual because we’re not telling them a damn thing about Sophie. They’re not leaving until they get something, or until we head out of here.”

“Sophie?” she asked.

“Jamie’s girlfriend.”

Now that she was back with Nathan, after his big brother had gone to Sydney to find her, the press was all over them, demanding their story. Nathan wasn’t saying a word. No one was.

“Have you had any experience with this, Eve?” Luke asked. “With being in the public eye?”

She hesitated before nodding. “A long time ago.” She ran her hand over her cheek. “Now I stay behind the scenes. Out of the limelight.”

Luke frowned. “So you have been in the public eye before?”

“I…years ago.” She pursed her lips, obviously reluctant to speak about it. “I was injured. It was on the news a few times, and then people forgot about it.”

Her scar. He still needed to ask her more about it.

“I see.” It was Luke’s turn to purse his lips. “I don’t want to pry, Eve. But for your sake I have to know—at least before the paparazzi find out. Were you in any way responsible for your injury?”

Eve’s expression flattened. Her eyes turned dull, and Zachary’s heart ached for her. Her robe was closed, but he suspected her scar would be flushed an angry red if he could see it. “No,” she whispered. “Not in any way.”

Luke’s nod told Zachary the questioning was over. “Okay, then we’re going to help you through this nonsense. First and foremost, I’m assigning you a bodyguard. Someone who’ll stay with you at all times. If you’re not in the hotel, you’re with him. You go out, he goes with you.”

“God, no,” Eve objected vehemently. “I don’t want a bodyguard.”

“It’s not open to negotiation. You need one.”

And just like that, Eve had a bodyguard. Zachary would have grinned at Luke’s strong-arm tactics had he not agreed with him wholeheartedly. The closer the bodyguard stood, the farther away the press would be held.

“Next item on the agenda—the media.” Luke held up a finger, emphasizing the importance of what he was about to say. “Don’t answer their questions. Not one, no matter how much you want to. Whatever you say will be recorded, reported and all too often twisted into some nasty version of the truth. Reporters will fire them at you. Fast. Grab you unawares, shock you into responding, say things you’ll want to defend. They’re damn good at what they do, determined.” He grimaced. “Just keep your mouth shut and trust Jake to take care of things.”

“Jake?” Eve’s eyes were enormous, her face no less pale.

“Your bodyguard.”

Zachary didn’t love the idea of anyone but himself looking out for Eve’s wellbeing. But he obviously couldn’t do it. He’d already let her down—kissing her at the party. And based on the fact that he didn’t seem to have much control of his actions or emotions when the woman was around, he couldn’t promise her, or himself, he wouldn’t do something equally stupid again.

“Third thing, the airport today. Jake’ll knock on your door at eleven forty-five to escort you down to the hotel car park. You’re not driving there with the crew. Too risky. You’ll come with the band.”

“You’ll come with me,” Zachary added.

“Fine, she’ll travel with you. And Jake. Same story in Queensland. Stay with Jake. He’ll get you to the hotel and to the concert in relative peace.”

“Stay with Jake and me.”

Luke frowned. He looked at Zachary for a long minute. “When you’re in public, Eve, stick with Jake. Zachary, you’re in too deep, with the press and with Eve. You’re losing your objectivity.”

Objectivity? Hell, he’d lost it the minute he’d laid eyes on the woman. “Maybe I am.”

Luke snorted. “Yeah, sure. Maybe.” He turned his attention back to Eve. “Trust Jake. He’s been with the band since the beginning. Knows how to handle the press.”

Eve looked overwhelmed. “I, er, I have to see family when we’re on the Gold Coast. It’s my niece’s birthday tomorrow, and I promised to be there.”

“Then go. Jake will go too. You’re not a prisoner, Eve. You can still live your life. Go out. We’re just taking necessary precautions.” Luke stood. “Look, can you both do me a favor?”

Zachary raised an eyebrow in question.

“Keep it to yourselves. For now, at least. Whatever is going on, don’t give them any more fodder. Okay?”

Eve stared at him, bewildered, and Zachary had to wonder if she was taken aback by the idea of keeping it between the two of them, by the thought of the pap wanting more of them, or by the whole “for now” bit. Which hinted there might be a later for the two of them.

Was there?

Last night, Zachary had kept himself firmly grounded in the here and now. This morning he’d anticipated the near future—the few minutes or hours until he saw her again.

More than that? Hell. Who knew?

He gritted his teeth.

He knew.

There was definitely a later. Or there would be if he had anything to do with it. “Yeah, no prob. We’re good. No more fodder. For now.”

Luke gave a satisfied nod. “Good. Then if you don’t mind, I need to find Seth and Kaz. She’s heading back to Sydney this morning.”

“Whoa, Luke, hang on a sec.” Seth could have Luke for the rest of the day, for forever. But for the next minute or so, Zachary could sure use his help.

His friend looked at him.

“Tell Kaz I said goodbye.”

“Sure thing.”

“And please, tell Eve about my kid.”

“Your kid?”

“Yeah.”

“Uh… What kid?”

Zachary looked at Eve, who watched them both with narrowed eyes. “My point exactly. Thank you.”

Luke looked from him to Eve and back again, obviously confused. “Yeah, sure, any time. Can I go now?”

“Yep.” Zachary slung his arm around Luke’s shoulders and walked him to the door. “Thanks, man.”

“Yeah, anytime. But seriously, Zachary. Keep it between you two. You don’t need more shit now.”

Chapter Nine

Heart sore, Eve watched as Zachary saw Luke to the door.

Had he honestly just done that? Just foisted her question on to Luke so he didn’t have to answer?

Of course he had. And his behavior made sense. She’d asked him a personal question, gotten too close, and he’d done the only thing he could under the circumstances. Cut her off. Cut short the intimacy she’d assumed they’d created together and passed her question over to Luke.

She didn’t have a right to let this upset her. It was her own fault for assuming there was an intimacy between them in the first place. Had she forgotten that men didn’t get overly personal with scarred women? Especially not incredibly sexy men, superstars like Jonah Speed.

She blinked hard, trying to hide the hurt she had no right to feel, but must have failed, because Zachary’s eyes filled with concern when he turned back to her.

“Hey, are you okay?”

His care confused her. How could he so easily foist such a personal question onto Luke, yet look at her as if her pain mattered?

“I’m fine,” she lied.

“You’re worried about the paparazzi?”

Yes, but that wasn’t her primary concern. “I’ll deal with them.”

“Jake’s good,” Zachary reassured her. “He’ll look after you. And I promise, you’ll feel comfortable with him in minutes.”

“I’m sure I will.” She stood then and walked towards the door. No point drawing this out. “Well, I’m sure you have lots to do before we leave. So, maybe I’ll see you later.”

Eve said it with a casual detachment she in no way felt, and didn’t look his way as she walked. She didn’t count on him grabbing her arm as she passed, pulling her in and hauling her close to his very appealing, very solid body. “Eve?” His beautiful, unfamiliar brown eyes were clouded with worry. “What’s going on?”

She didn’t answer. Couldn’t. His behavior with Luke might have told her one thing, but the way his body curved sinuously against hers told her another altogether. Physically the intimacy was there—in spades.

“You’re pushing me away. Blocking me out. Why?” He ran his fingers down her cheek in a gesture so personal, Eve couldn’t breathe for a good few seconds. What the…?

He’d traced his fingers over her face in the exact way she always did, as if he were carrying out the action for her. Sensing her discomfort and reacting as she would.

Thrown by the familiarity of his touch—and by the physical proximity of his hand to her scars, Eve didn’t check her response. “I’m not the one doing the pushing, Zachary.”

His face creased in confusion. “You think I’m pushing you away?”

She bit her tongue. God, why had she said that? “Look, it’s nothing. Ignore me. You were right. I’m just upset about the press and my face being plastered over every newspaper in Australia. It’s tough to comprehend that I suddenly need a security guard just to walk down the road. I’m not used to it is all.”

Zachary stared deep into her eyes as though he could read her thoughts. “No, that’s not all. Something else is upsetting you. Something else…like me, and I don’t know why.”

And there it was again, the intimacy, the connection she’d just tried to convince herself she shouldn’t be feeling.

“Eve. Talk to me.”

She clung to that connection, hoping against hope she wasn’t imagining it. “You wouldn’t answer my question.”

“Huh?”

“About your being a father. You avoided it.”

“What? When? Luke just answered.”

“That’s just the thing. Luke answered. Not you.”

“Does it make a difference?” He looked perplexed. “You asked, then we got sidetracked by the whole media debacle and I didn’t have a chance to respond. Soon as I realized that, I wanted you to know the truth.”

His reply was so logical it made Eve feel petty. Still… “I’d have like to hear it from you. Not your band manager.”

“I figured you’d believe it if it came from Luke.”

Her jaw dropped. “Are you implying I wouldn’t have believed you?”

Zachary shrugged and looked away. He didn’t let her go, but his hold on her loosened. “The rest of the world didn’t when the story broke.”

Oh, dear God. The poor man. “Zachary.” She waited until he returned his gaze to her face. “I’m not the rest of the world.”

He looked at her for a very long time, a thousand emotions playing through his eyes before his arm tightened around her again. “No, you certainly aren’t.”

She buried her face against his chest. “It just kind of hurt that you didn’t answer yourself.”

“Your question threw me. It took me back to a bad place, a bad time.”

“I shouldn’t have asked.”

“Yeah, you should have. I’d rather you ask than look elsewhere for answers.”

“Yet you sent me elsewhere for the answer.”

“I referred it to Luke.” He sighed deeply. “That’s my standard way of handling the hard questions. The landmines that have the potential to blow up in my face.”

Another frisson of hurt shot through her and she pulled away from him. “So I’m a landmine?”

“No, Tiny.” Zachary frowned. “The question you asked? That’s the landmine. One that already blew up in my face. I had to face the backlash, the rumors, the lies, the press hounding me day in and day out, making up crap. Luke dealt with it at the time, just like he deals with all the shit we face. My instinct, when you asked, was to let Luke deal with it again.” He ran a hand through his hair. “I shouldn’t have. I should just have given you a straight answer.” He blew out a long breath. “You touched on a sore point. I wasn’t prepared.”

“How about now?”

“Now what?”

“Are you prepared to talk about it?”

“It’s the ugly side of fame, Eve. You sure you want to hear about it?”

She wanted to hear everything about him, no matter how ugly. “Only if you’re up to discussing it.”

He squared his shoulders. “Seven months ago a woman sent Luke a lawyer’s letter. She had a baby, it said, I was the baby’s father, and could I please hand over child support for the rest of the kid’s life.”

“Did you know her?”

“I didn’t recognize her name and couldn’t remember having met her, never mind…getting her pregnant, so of course I denied her accusations. I assumed that would be it, end of story, but no. A day later she went to the press. Told anyone who’d listen that she and I had had a torrid one-week affair when I was in Colorado the year before, and the kid was the result.” Zachary’s face turned hard. “Anyone who’d listen turned out to be every rag in the States. Every TV channel too. Suddenly I was the biggest villain on earth. The wealthy rock star who refused to pay child maintenance. I was hauled over the coals. Ripped to shreds by the press.”

“Oh, God. Zachary, I’m so sorry.”

He gave her a hollow smile. “That wasn’t the worst of it. Within a week of the news breaking, three other women came forward with similar stories. Instead of Jonah Speed superstar, I became Jonah Speed, super-sperm-producer.”

Eve shuddered at the humiliation he must have experienced. “What happened?”

“We asked for paternity tests. Requested the women take the children to a lab for genetic testing. Three of my accusers, including the first woman who’d stepped forward, vanished, kids in tow, retractions of their accusations firmly in my lawyers’ hands. The fourth one went ahead and had the test.”

“And?”

He gritted his teeth. “It wasn’t mine.”

She studied him for a long moment. “Did you think it might be?”

“Honestly?”

“Yeah, Zachary. Honestly.”

“When she took the test, I was worried.”

“Did you know her?” She couldn’t help thinking that he hadn’t actually denied knowing the first woman. He simply hadn’t recognized or remembered her.

“She looked vaguely familiar. I may have slept with her.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “It’s like I told you last night. I’ve slept with a lot of women over the last three years. Too many to remember names and faces.”

Eve shuddered.

“They were meaningless. Every one of them. Easy lays because women offered themselves to me.”

Her sympathy soured.

Zachary must have noticed. “You have to understand, the fame was sudden. Almost overnight I went from being unknown Zachary Pace to world-famous Jonah Speed. Suddenly everyone wanted a piece of me. And of Nathan and Seth. Of Luke too. Women and men threw themselves at us. It’s a strong aphrodisiac, that. Knowing I could pick and choose whenever I wanted. And no one ever said no.”

Of course no one ever said no. How could anyone in his or her right mind say no to Jonah Speed? She certainly hadn’t.

“I used condoms. Every time. But feasibly, yeah. There was a possibility the child was mine. And it scared the crap out of me. I want kids someday. But with a woman I love. Not a stranger I spent a few unimportant hours with.”

This was a first for Zachary. He’d never exposed so much of himself to a woman. Not since he’d become Jonah Speed, anyway. When it came to the personal stuff, he saved his thoughts for Luke and his brothers. No one else. Yet here he was, sharing his deepest and darkest with Eve.

“That explains why you hate the paparazzi so much.”

“In a nutshell.” The fact that they dogged his every public footstep paled in importance when compared to the baby scandal.

“Did they ever report that you weren’t the father?”

“A few places mentioned it. Buried it in the middle of news reports somewhere. It was no longer sensational. Not a scandal anymore. No scandal means no interest. They forgot about it way before I did.”

Her face softened in empathy. “That sucks, Zachary. Big time.”

He snorted. “Yeah. It sucked. Great big dingo balls.” Fucking rhinoceros balls, actually.

“Is that why you haven’t slept with a woman in six months…until last night?”

Zachary watched her carefully. “That’s exactly why. The experience killed my appetite for meaningless sex.” It hadn’t killed his appetite for sex though. The second he’d laid eyes on Eve, he’d wanted her with a savage hunger

“I’d never do that, you know,” she said very softly.

“Do what?”

“Accuse you of being the father of my child. Or try to get pregnant by you.”

“Of course you wouldn’t.” He didn’t doubt her sincerity for a second.

“It’s just, last night… When… Uh, the second time…”

Ah. So that’s where she was going. “Tiny, we got caught up in the moment. Both of us. Hell, you had me so turned on, a condom was the last thing on my mind. If I could have taken you bare, I would have.”

“But you didn’t. You stopped me.”

“And it almost killed me. I came mighty close to losing my load before I ever got inside you.” The remembered agony made him want to howl in pain now.

“I’d have stopped myself if I’d known what you’d been through.” Her smile was small, but it was there.

“I’m sorry, Tiny.”

“For what?”

“Leaving it to Luke to answer your question.”

Eve stepped up close and stroked his face, just the way he’d stroked hers earlier. The action sent hot chills up his spine. “Think you and I will ever stop apologizing to each other?”

“We’re only just getting to know each other. We’re going to make mistakes. If an apology helps right the wrongs, I’m gonna carry on apologizing.”

“Then I’m sorry too. For taking offense when I shouldn’t have.”

“I’d never hurt you, Eve. Not intentionally. But if I do, tell me so I can make it right.”

“You’ve made it right.” She touched her lips to his neck, and just like that Zachary was aroused again.

Eve noticed. She pushed her stomach into his growing erection. “Zachary?”

“Hmmm?” Concentrating became hard. All he could focus on was the way she felt against him. The way her soft curves molded to the shape of his body.

“Would you kiss me now?”

“I’d kiss you anytime.” He brushed his lips tenderly over hers.

“Mmm.” She pressed her mouth up against his, demanding more. He gave it, taking her lips wantonly, sliding his tongue over hers, tasting the desire on her breath.

Zachary yanked at the belt of her robe, untying it and pushing the material over her shoulders, leaving her naked in his arms. Adorably, beautifully naked.

Eve in her robe had been cute. Eve out of it blew his mind.

If Zachary combined the pleasure he’d received from having sex with every one of those hundreds of women, overall it could not come close to the satisfaction he gained from one kiss with Eve.

Because being with Eve meant something to him.

Yeah, actually, something didn’t begin to cut it. Eve meant a whole lot more than something. Which was crazy, seeing as he’d known her all of twelve hours. But she’d hit the nail on the head when she’d said she wasn’t the rest of the world. Eve was special. And every minute he spent with her, she became more special.

Her fingers were on his stomach, pushing his shirt up. Up, up and over his shoulders. She broke the kiss only long enough to get rid of it, then ran her fingers over his bare chest, traveling over every inch of his flesh, leaving burn marks from the heat of her touch and making delicious noises as she did.

Zachary lost his jeans and boxers but kept hold of the condom he’d deliberately shoved in his back pocket before coming to her room.

He kissed her as he freed the condom of its wrapping and rolled it over his cock. Kissed her as he caught her under her ass and lifted her up, urging her to wrap her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist. Kissed her as he shuffled them a few steps to the right and found what he sought.

The wall.

Support.

She was going to need it.

Soon as he had her pinned against it, he took her. Rocked his hips and thrust inside her waiting warmth.

Ah, Christ!

The heat almost killed him. Her pussy was a tight glove, clasping him, holding him inside.

And there it was. The music he heard when he was with her. Not the same tune he’d heard last night. This was a different one, a more urgent one. Faster, louder, a heady tempo.

He fucked her to its rhythm, rocked into her to the beat of the song. And was stunned to find her responding, swaying to the same beat. She’d done it last night too. She wasn’t just moving to his tempo, she was tapping his shoulder, drumming out the song on his flesh.

Ah. Of course. He did the same to her ass. Tapped on it, played his song. Played the music he only heard with her.

Christ, he should stop. Should write it down. This was a song worth sharing. Already he’d forgotten the tune from last night. Not the sensation. Hell, no way he’d ever forget that, just the tune. The intricate notes.

Stop to write down music? Ha. Never. Never letting her go.

Not when holding her felt this fucking good. Not when making love to her brought every nerve ending to life. Not when he’d never felt this alive.

Being with Eve, fucking her… It felt more right than breathing.

The song grew louder, the tempo faster.

They danced, rocking together. He kissed her, still hadn’t released her mouth. Never wanted to release her mouth. The chocolate temptation was gone, replaced by fresh mint. Just as delicious, just as tempting.

And then her fingers faltered, losing the beat. Her hips faltered as well, forgetting to rock with him. Her nails clawed his shoulders, scratching at his skin, and her mouth went slack.

She groaned against his lips.

Zachary’s balls tightened.

“C-coming,” she gasped.

And she was. Coming. All over his cock. Her pussy tightening, relaxing, tightening, relaxing, grabbing at him and releasing.

Zachary lost the beat. He lost his mind. All he could feel was her pussy, holding him, convulsing around him, her juices wetting his balls.

All he could feel was her. All he wanted was her. He came in a frantic rush, his seed blasting through his shaft.

Oh, God.

Christ.

Fuck.

He couldn’t think. Didn’t try. Just felt. And what he felt was a little piece of heaven, all wrapped around him.

Chapter Ten

Eve wandered through the hotel suite, staring in amazement at the sheer opulence of the Palazzo Versace. She’d never seen anything like it, never experienced such over-the-top luxury. She wasn’t sure she liked it. It was too much for her, but still, wow. She could certainly see herself enjoying the comforts and lavishness of Zachary’s suite.

Again, it was different from her hotel room. Not to say her accommodation wasn’t opulent. It was. Just not to the same degree as this.

For the umpteenth time she found herself shaking her head, stunned she stood in Zachary’s suite, stunned she had become—at least for now—a part of his life.

The band wasn’t performing on the Gold Coast, just staying in the hotel here. Tomorrow afternoon they’d be driven through to Brisbane, where they’d hold their fourth Aussie concert at the Suncorp Stadium. Just one show there, then off to Adelaide the next day.

Eve was quickly learning what life on the road was all about. Which meant she was quickly starting to appreciate the offerings of a luxury hotel. Traveling every two or three days could become exhausting very quickly.

But she wasn’t complaining. Not when she stood in Zachary’s room with him.

After the drama of the morning, the day had passed uneventfully. She and Zachary had ordered breakfast in her room and fed each other pieces of fruit and warm pastries while sitting naked on her bed.

She didn’t even contemplate going out. The flurry of the press around her when she’d arrived back in Australia eleven years ago had been enough media attention to last a lifetime.

The trip to the airport had been easy enough. She’d been ushered into the hotel car park by Jake. He’d turned out to be a giant of a man who spoke little, interfered only when necessary and did things his way.

Zachary grinned at her when she was finally nestled into his side in the back of a plush Mercedes. “You’ll get used to it,” he promised. “By this time tomorrow you won’t even notice you have a bodyguard.”

Eve had turned to peer out the back window of the Merc as they’d driven off. Sure enough, a horde of photographers, reporters and press vans were gathered across the road from the hotel entrance, and a helicopter circled overhead. She breathed a sigh of relief when they turned the corner and she lost sight of the chaos—although the constant chop, chop, chop of the helicopter blades filtered through the air for a few more blocks.

She’d sat beside Zachary on the plane too, a private jet which she learned was being used to fly only the band members and their significant others from city to city while in Australia. Zachary introduced her to Seth and Nathan, to Sophie as well, and to the other three other band members—Bill, who played the synthesizer, Arnie on saxophone and Tim, Speed’s bass guitarist.

Yep, Luke had given them all a cursory introduction back in Sydney, but it hadn’t been personal, like today.

During the flight, Delilah and Devine chatted with her at length, insisting Sophie and Eve come up to Devine’s room later so they could introduce Sophie to the delights of Eve’s makeup case and skills. They’d agreed to meet at six thirty, before dinner, which had been scheduled in the hotel’s private dining room.

What amazed Eve was how normal all these people were. Apart from Sophie, who’d told her she’d just quit her job as a cleaner to join Nathan on tour, none of them lived a life at all similar to Eve’s. They lived in the world of superstardom. Yet they were all so nice.

Seth sat beside Luke, a faraway look in his blue eyes, as if he were lost to a wonderful dream. Luke, his hands now bandaged, worked on some papers, every now and again pausing to glance at Seth.

Nathan did not take his gaze off Sophie the entire time.

Eve watched him for a while. He was ridiculously good-looking, with flawless, model-like features. Perfectly beautiful, his eyes were similar to Zachary’s. Brown, with hints of green and black woven through them. Interesting eyes. Stunning eyes.

The Paces had a similar look about them. One glance would tell a stranger they were brothers. They were all gorgeous, no two ways about it. However, Seth, with his blue eyes, was smaller than the older two. A little more feminine even, although his lean strength and unshaven cheeks made him all man. And while Nathan had that picture-perfect look going for him, Zachary was broader and damn, he smoldered sexuality. It radiated off him in waves.

She’d noticed hotel and airport staff alike had similar reactions to the three brothers. They smiled at Seth, instantly beguiled by his dreaminess. They stared, entranced, at Nathan, and became flustered around Zachary. More than one person had tugged at the collar of their shirts around him, as if they wanted nothing more than to strip those shirts off.

Oh, yeah, Eve understood. She’d experienced just that. And then had stripped off her shirt, exposing her scars and her heart.

She turned to look at him now, leaning over the set of drums that stood in the foyer of the suite, adjusting something.

How easy it would be to fall in love with him. To just hand him her heart, knowing she’d never be able to take it back. How careful would she have to be to ensure she didn’t?

She already suspected it was too late to take those precautions. Which made her dumb as shit, because she could never have him in the long term. While it was fine to live in the here and now, to enjoy the time they had together, Zachary’s future belonged to another. And even if it didn’t, there was no way he would ever give his heart to a woman whose face had been permanently scarred by an exploding window while she was on holiday.

Zachary sat on his throne, sticks in hand, and tapped out a tune on his drums.

Eve froze.

He drummed a little more energetically.

Her heart began to pound.

Zachary closed his eyes and seemed to merge with his drums. He rapped with fluid movements, his muscles flexing in time with his beat, his actions so sure, so sexy it was like he’d been born playing drums. As if the instruments were a natural extension of the man.

The beat became a song, one she recognized. He played the underlying cadence of “Thunder ’n Rain”.

He was brilliant. Enthralling. She couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t move. She was trapped in the rhythm of his drums, trapped in the incredible music he made.

The tempo vibrated through the rooms, echoed across the floors and reverberated up her legs, down her spine.

This wasn’t Zachary. This was Jonah, master musician and professional percussionist. And she had the pleasure of watching him play in a private performance.

Weak-kneed, Eve pressed herself against the archway to the foyer, listening to him, watching him and throbbing inside. His music was sheer magic, his appearance breathtaking. She ached inside, touched by something unfathomable as he performed. He was masterful, brilliant, and she was overwhelmed by her conflicting emotions.

She could spend the rest of her life standing here, content to watch him perform. At the same time she knew this would never be enough for her. Because now that she’d experienced his music in person, she wanted more from Zachary.

She wanted everything. His music, his tempo, his dedication… His heart. She wanted him with a compulsion that shook her to the core.

Her heart pounded so hard it took a few seconds to realize it was the only beat she now heard. Zachary sat on his throne, drumsticks in hand, staring at her.

“Th-that was stunning.” Words could never adequately describe how his playing affected her.

He shrugged. “Just messing around.” His words were light, his eyes were not. They were heavy-lidded and dark, and his gaze was hungry.

“Feel free to continue messing around. Don’t stop for me.”

He turned his attention back to playing and rapped on a drum again, just once. “Can’t do it, Tiny.”

“Can’t do what?”

“Play when you’re looking at me like that.”

She couldn’t help it, couldn’t not look at him like she was. She closed her eyes. “That better?”

“No. I have a massive erection, and playing my drums is not going to help me lose it.”

“Your playing is incredibly arousing.”

“It’s not the drums that have me aroused. Not the music either.”

Her breasts swelled, her nipples tightening. She opened her eyes again, found his gaze centered on her, hungrier than before. “Pacey?”

“Yeah?”

She recalled what he’d said last night about his other talent with his sticks, and her belly seemed to flip upside down. “You don’t really do that with your drumsticks, do you?”

“Oh yeah, beautiful. I really do.”

He held her gaze for just a second too long, and the air between them filled with a deafening silence. So silent, Eve feared Zachary would hear her heart pounding.

She crossed one leg over the other, squeezing her thighs together, but that only increased the ache and the throbbing. “Ouch.”

The drummer blinked. “Ouch?”

“Ouch,” she concurred, then explained in detail, “Splinters.” Yeah, actually, no. Splinters were the furthest thing from her mind.

Zachary chuckled hoarsely. “Splinters?”

“Believe me, no one wants to get splinters down there.” Her throat felt like sandpaper.

“The sticks are varnished. No fear of splinters there.”

“And your unvarnished ones?”

“I choose my tools carefully, oh, cautious one.” The air snapped and shimmered. “You know, I could make you come without laying anything more than my varnished tools on you.”

Eve blinked. “Prove it.” Her belly tumbled once more, this time in anticipation.

His voice had dropped, the deep baritone coming out soft and low, like a rumbled caress. “It’ll be my pleasure. And yours. Step closer.”

She did. Walked over until all that separated them were his drums and cymbals. She placed her hands on one of the drums and leaned forward. “Can’t get closer than this.”

“Close enough. For now.”

Jonah tapped his foot once, the rise and drop of his knee the only clue that he’d moved. That, and the reverberation through the drums as a low, soft boom echoed through the foyer.

The sound vibrated through her arms and down her body. She jerked in surprise. “Wh-what are you doing?”

“Proving a point.” And his drum boomed again, a little harder.

This time the vibrations hit not only her arms, but her lower body as well, where it was pressed against the drum. The sound and feel echoed through her hips and groin.

She blinked.

Zachary smiled a knowing smile.

“Zach—”

“Shh. Just feel the beat.”

He began to play then, continually, a soft, sexy beat. Slow and seductive.

She tried to concentrate. Tried to identify the song but in the end gave up. The vibrations shivering through her made thinking too difficult.

The tempo was hypnotic, and Eve closed her eyes, letting it draw her in, letting her heart pick up the rhythm of the sound and pulse in time with it. But it wasn’t just the music that caught her. It was the movement of the drum. The gentle, ongoing throb. It wasn’t just her heart pulsing. Her groin pulsed too. Each beat shuddered through her pussy, a gentle tap against her clit. Or maybe it was around her clit, or under. No, the tap seemed to surround it, surround her whole groin.

The slow, steady vibration that had begun as a pleasant beat soon changed, increasing in tempo. Her pussy pulsated harder, and she clenched, realizing, almost belatedly, how arousing the rhythm had become.

A heartbeat in her pussy, stimulating, teasing.

She opened one eye and looked at him, stunned. “Za—”

“Uh-uh, Eve. Not one word. Close your eyes.”

She obeyed, speechless as moisture pooled between her legs. On some level she tried not to let go, not give herself over to the sweet harmony of Zachary’s drums, but on another level, a deeper one, she knew she didn’t stand a chance. She shifted closer, pushing herself harder against the drum.

He rewarded her by playing a little harder, a little faster.

The contented sigh that escaped her lips melded with the sound of percussion in the air around her.

And then the beat changed, slowed. Rather than a cacophony of sounds and taps, only two remained. One deep and steady, the other lighter, from the drum she rested against.

Before she could question it, something tickled down the front of her shirt. A soft whisper from her throat to her waist.

She tugged heavy lids open.

Zachary’s arm was stretched toward her, and as she watched, he drew his drumstick up again, this time tracing the outline of her breasts.

Her breath caught.

“You’re very beautiful when you’re aroused.” The tip of the drumstick found her nipple, circled it in a whispered caress.

She hardly noticed. Zachary’s brown eyes had darkened. They held her spellbound.

“The way your lips part, and the tip of your tongue wets the lower one?” His gaze dropped to her mouth. “Sexiest thing I’ve ever seen.”

His drumstick drifted over to her other nipple.

Eve’s chest felt heavy, as though her breasts had swelled beneath his attention. Her nipples were stiff beads of pleasure, and each sweep of the stick over them made her tingle.

“It makes me want to know how those lips would feel around my shaft, how your tongue would wet my cock.”

Eve swallowed at the image he painted. It made her want to wrap her lips around his shaft, lick him from root to tip.

“Here’s what I need you to do, Tiny.” He stroked the tip of one stick up her chest and neck, and traced her mouth with it.

How he kept the touch so gentle, so erotic, Eve had no idea. Years of experience with his sticks was her only answer.

“Lose the skirt. Get rid of it. Good as you look in it, and…” He stopped, cleared his throat. “And you do look edible in it, for this I need it out of the way.”

Trapped by the greed in his eyes, Eve reached behind her, unfastened the skirt and shimmied out of it so she stood before him in her blouse and panties.

Zachary said something, a nonsensical word that came out like a growl. And then his drumstick trailed carnally down her front, down between her aroused breasts, down over her navel, down to where the edge of her shirt met the elastic of her panties.

And that’s where it stopped trailing.

“I’ve played many instruments before.” His gaze was focused on the point where his stick touched her panties. “Made music on everything from violins to saxophones, drums to didgeridoos, but never…” Again he cleared his throat. “Never have I anticipated creating symphonies like right now.” His voice alone was a tempestuous assault on her nerves. “Never have I wanted to make music like I want to make music with you.”

Eve’s knees turned to mush. Wet heat pooled between her legs. She had to clutch the drums to ensure she stayed upright.

And her weakness only increased as he dragged the tip of that maddening drumstick lower, finding her clit, and pressing with just the tiniest amount of pressure against it.

Eve almost climaxed on the spot.

She closed her eyes, ground her teeth, clenched her fingers over the rim of the drums and held every muscle rigid in an effort not to.

Zachary’s hum of satisfaction told her he’d noticed. He eased the pressure minutely. Long seconds passed where all Eve heard was the sound of her breath and his, hers fast and shallow, his slower, softer.

And then the tip of the drumstick was gone. But not for long. Zachary flattened the stick so he held it parallel to her legs, the tip resting on her clit.

He strummed her pussy. Strummed it with his drumstick like a cellist strummed strings with a bow. He played that stick over her, drawing it up and down, ever so gently, ever so erotically.

And she stood there, panting, her legs trembling, her pussy pulsing as he created his music.

Never, in Eve’s wildest imagination would she have thought she could be brought to the edge of paradise by a long, thin piece of wood. But Zachary’s skill had her right there, on the precipice.

His exquisite tenderness and delectable creativity had her oscillating between wanting to come and wanting the sensation to continue for eternity. He generated such sweet harmony within, Eve lost herself to the mastery of his hand, the skill of his touch—and still, as promised, he hadn’t actually laid a finger on her.

And then the real music began, the slow beat of his second stick against his drum, the vibration of the boom of his bass drum.

And while it began slow, to match the rhythm with which he drew his bow—his stick—over her pussy and clit, soon it increased in pace, as Zachary’s tunes always seemed to. As the drumming became faster and the boom harder, he played her more quickly.

It was all too much. Sensory overload. The sensations he filled her with could not be contained. They blossomed and grew, doubling in intensity, then tripling, until she could no longer hold them within.

She came, crying his name out loud as he brought her endless waves of exquisite pleasure.

Long, rapturous moments passed before Eve came back to herself. Before her mind began to work and the world made sense.

And when her vision cleared and her gaze took in Zachary, sitting on his throne, king of his drums, king of his music, king of her, she could resist the temptation he’d painted for her no longer.

Without giving him a second to object, she rounded the drums, squeezed before him and dropped to her knees, freeing his cock from his jeans.

She licked her lips.

His drumsticks hit the floor with a dull thud seconds later, and for a good few minutes Eve took charge of the music, playing him with her lips and her tongue and her teeth, until Zachary reached his very own crescendo.

Dinner was a leisurely event filled with laughter and small talk. Zachary was more relaxed than he’d been in months, and Eve seemed to have gotten over her awe of meeting his brothers. She now chattered away with them as though she’d known them for years.

She chattered happily with Delilah and Devine as well. And with Sophie, who’d come to dinner with her face fully made up and looking extraordinarily beautiful. It had taken Nathan a good few minutes to find his voice, and even then, he hadn’t bothered with speech. He simply tipped Sophie over and kissed her in front of everyone. Again.

Zachary would have kissed Eve, but she’d threatened to poke him in both eyes if he even attempted another public display of affection. And after their experience at the after party, he was more than okay with that.

“A bath,” he whispered now to the woman who was fast monopolizing every one of his waking thoughts.

“What about it?” she whispered back.

“Let’s ditch dessert and go take one. Together.” The massive spa in the bathroom had captured his attention—and imagination—the second he’d seen it.

She looked at him, horrified. “Are you insane? Nice as that bath looks, I can’t justify missing dessert for a tub full of hot water.”

“Hot water…and me.”

She leaned back and surveyed him carefully, giving him a slow once-over. “You look okay. Tempting even…”

“But?”

“But did you get a look at the dessert menu? I’m afraid you have nothing on the soufflé.”

“Seriously?” He gaped at her. “You’re throwing me over for…for…a puffy cake?”

“Not throwing you over. No. We could always share.” She blinked prettily, obviously happy with her well-thought-out compromise. “So long as you order the panna cotta. I’m dying to try that too.”

He raised his hands in disbelief. “Rejected again.”

Eve grinned. “Not rejected. Just…postponed.”

They ordered the soufflé and the panna cotta, and Zachary watched, both charmed and aroused, as Eve consumed them both.

When the plates had been cleared away, and he once again suggested the bath, more eager then ever to get her into that hot tub, Eve once again vetoed the idea.

“How about a walk rather? Along the promenade?”

“Hot sex with a hot woman in a hot tub, or a walk in public.” He held his hands out, palms up, as though weighing up his options. “Hmm. Which one, which one…?”

“C’mon, lazy bones.” She grabbed his arm and pulled him to his feet, which just charmed him even more, watching the slip of a woman yanking a man almost twice her size out of his seat. “I’ve been locked up in either a hotel or a plane all day long. I need air. Need to breathe a little and stretch my legs.”

He frowned. “You sure you’re up to going out there?” As far as he knew, the press had not been informed of their current accommodation. Luke had spread subtle rumors about Speed staying in Brisbane. But one could never be too cautious, especially seeing how edgy Eve had been about the pap outside the Melbourne hotel. “It’s been a while since I went out and haven’t been recognized.”

Eve reached into her bag and pulled out two caps. “I come prepared, Pacey. With Jake’s help. Here you go, put it on.” She handed him a navy cap with I LOVE BROADBEACH embroidered on it in gold, and popped a matching pink one on her head. “We’ll just be regular tourists. No one will even notice us. Especially with Jake walking behind and Brayden up ahead.”

Brayden, his bodyguard.

“You sure about this?”

“Sure, I’m sure. As long as Jake and Brayden don’t make it obvious what they’re doing, I’d love to get out for a while.”

Ten minutes later, caps on, Eve and Zachary strolled outside, arm in arm. Brayden had suggested they walk around the hotel’s private marina instead of the promenade, and Zachary had jumped at the suggestion. It was mostly deserted, and they made their way through the jetties and boats, oblivious to anything but each other. Jake and Brayden were indeed subtle enough—and far away enough—that after a minute or two Eve seemed to stop noticing them.

“I like your brothers,” she said. “Luke too.”

The boats rocked gently in the still water.

“They’re good guys. All three of them. And Luke might as well be part of the family. He’s like a brother to all of us.” He laughed. “Well, except to Seth.”

“They seem…close.”

Subtle choice of words. “More than close. Seth’s been in love with him for years. I think he finally wore Luke down. Probably with his sheer persistence and belief they were meant to be together.” Both Zachary and Nathan had watched, amused and perplexed, as Seth decided Luke was meant for him and Luke spent eight years denying it.

The two older Paces had never harbored any doubt that Seth would finally get Luke to see things from his perspective. The two were perfect for each other.

“Nathan and Sophie seem nice too.”

“I don’t know Sophie that well. But I’ve never seen Nath happier. She’s good for him. And damn, when she’s around his voice is stronger than ever.” Nathan’s performance last night had almost brought the house down. “They both believe they were fated to be together.”

“Like you and the redhead are fated?”

Jeez, why had he even brought up the word “fated”? Zachary’s step faltered. “I haven’t thought about her since last night. Still don’t want to. Can we leave it at that?” With every minute that passed, thoughts of his redhead became less and less frequent.

“We can. I was just wondering at the coincidence of two brothers believing they were fated to be with their partners.”

“Three brothers,” Zachary corrected. “Seth thinks my grandmother sang to him about Luke years before I ever met him at college. He thinks she knew he was coming.”

“Did your grandmother also have a gift? Could she see things?”

Zachary shrugged. “Sure seems that way. She had songs for Nathan and Seth as well.”

“Eleven years ago I’d have laughed at the idea that someone could see the future. Now I know better.”

She’d given him the opening Zachary had been looking for, and he took it. “Are you ready to talk about what happened eleven years ago?” His need to know went beyond regular curiosity. Eve had somehow inserted herself in his heart, and he wanted to find out everything there was to know about her.

It was her turn to falter, but Zachary just tightened his hold on her and kept on walking.

“I told you. A window exploded. I got hurt.” She waved her hand at her side as though it was nothing serious. The quiver in her voice told him differently.

Zachary challenged her as gently as he could. “Windows don’t just explode, Tiny. They just don’t work that way. Balloons explode when they’re blown too full of air, bombs explode when they’re set off. Windows? Not so much.”

“Okay.” She shrugged. “So first a bomb went off, and then the window exploded. Same thing, really.”

Chapter Eleven

Zachary tripped. Fell right over the air in front of his feet.

“Easy.” Eve steadied him. “Do that again, and you’ll land on your nose.” She went for humor, but her laugh sounded hollow.

The blood had drained from his face. All sensation, all reason hemorrhaged out of him. “Eve…”

Christ, he couldn’t speak. Couldn’t get his throat to work properly.

He planted his hands on her arms, forcing her to turn around and look at him.

“It was a long time ago, Zachary,” she said vaguely. “Hardly worth bringing up now.”

“Wh—?” Damn it. “How?”

“See, this is why I don’t talk about it. Everyone overreacts.”

Zachary closed his eyes, realized he hadn’t breathed since she’d said a bomb exploded—a fucking bomb!—and filled his lungs with oxygen. It didn’t stop the knife-like pain that wedged between his ribs.

“Okay, Eve. Give it to me in small sentences. Explain it simply so I don’t overreact.” There was no way he’d understood her correctly. She’d said something else. Something very, very different. She had to have.

The people he knew, the people he loved, were not bomb victims.

“Can we walk while I do?”

“We can do whatever you like, just tell me.” He wasn’t sure he had the coordination to walk. Putting one foot in front of the other seemed way too complex a challenge all of a sudden. But he did it. Forced himself into motion for her.

“It was long ago,” she said. “2002.”

He racked his brain to find significance in the year and came up blank.

“I was fourteen.”

Still a child. A teenager.

“My parents took the family—me, my sister and my brother—to Bali.” She sighed. “You have to understand, a family holiday somewhere outside of New South Wales was a big deal. Huge. We never went away. It just wasn’t something we could afford. So when my dad announced we were going, it was like…a miracle.”

Some fucking miracle.

“A tropical island sounded like paradise. And it was. Utterly beautiful. Heaven on earth. The beaches, the ocean. Stunning. I spent so much time in the water and the sun, I got these blond highlights in my hair. My skin was tanned golden.”

Her skin was pale now, as though she spent little to no time in the sun.

“My brother and sister were the same. We just…we had the best time. Holidays don’t get better than that.”

Bali, 2002. Alarm bells rang somewhere in the back of Zachary’s mind.

“On our seventh night there—we went for eight—we left our hotel in Kuta to eat in the town.”

“Kuta?”

“Holiday district.” Her voice faded.

“What happened?”

She sighed again, the air rattling from her chest, and he sensed her loathing to talk.

“Tiny?” He pulled her close. “Help me understand. Please.”

“We…uh…we walked there. All of us. My brother and I ran ahead, my sister hung back with my parents. The weather was perfect. Hot, humid, just right for an island.”

Silence again.

Zachary didn’t push her. An unpleasant chill at the base of his neck told him whatever he’d thought about Eve’s experience, the reality was far, far worse.

“There was a shop with some dresses in the window. I stopped to look, saw one I really liked. Knew Bree would look hot in it, so I turned back to call her to come see it. Yelled through the streets of Kuta. My, uh, my brother, Lochlan, of course, didn’t stop. Girls’ clothing did not capture the imagination of a sixteen-year-old guy.”

She’d ceased walking now, although Zachary suspected she didn’t realize it.

“I heard the first explosion. Felt it too. It roared right through me. Deafening.” She placed a hand over her ear. “Sent me flying. But…but I didn’t hear the next one. Didn’t even know there was a next one, which is funny really ’cause that second one was much worse, apparently. Much…bigger.” She tugged on the top of her ear. “In fact, I didn’t hear anything for a while after that. Not properly anyway. The explosions, I was told, damaged my eardrums.”

Zachary was frozen. Ice slid down his ribs, splintering in his chest.

Fuck, he’d never reacted like this before. Never felt someone else’s pain as deeply as he did Eve’s. What was it about her that heightened his every emotion, his every thought?

“Turns out…” Again, she waved her hand vaguely in the air. “Turns out, the window I’d been staring in saved my life. It, um, left me scarred. Really badly scarred, and it cost me heaps of blood, but…” She ran her fingers over her cheek. “It saved my life. If I hadn’t been looking in it, I’d have been standing a hundred meters down the road.” She pointed, as if staring that hundred meters down the road. “With my brother.”

Zachary followed her finger, looked in that direction, and then comprehended what she’d said. That’s when he clicked. That’s when he remembered his walk along Coogee Beach in Sydney, the monument built on the cliff tops honoring the more than eighty Australians who’d lost their lives in the Bali bombings.

Nausea slammed into him.

Christ.

Fuck.

No. Just, no.

“Eve…” He had to clear his throat. “Your brother?” He shouldn’t feel like this. Shouldn’t be so completely gutted.

She shook her head. “Lochie didn’t stop to look in that window. He just went on ahead. Without me.”

Tears prickled the back of his eyes, and God help him, Zachary was not a crier. His throat closed, forcing air to wheeze through it.

Talk.

He needed to say something. Needed to ask questions, comfort her. But fuck, he couldn’t. He wasn’t capable.

Last night, backstage, Zachary had sensed a connection between himself and Eve. It had grown over the last twenty-four hours. But this now, his reaction to her story, this was something a whole lot bigger than a connection. This was something inexplicable.

Eve’s grief was his own.

“Parents?” he finally managed to croak. “Sister?” Bree. She hadn’t been with her brother. Couldn’t have been. She’d spoken to Eve this morning.

“They found me. Found the glass too.”

“Did…” Jesus, this was hard. “Did they find your brother?”

Her voice was whisper soft. “No.”

Still Eve stared where she’d pointed, one hundred meters down the road of her memories. Did she see him? Her brother? Standing there? Or…

Nausea struck again, violently.

Or…not standing there anymore?

“The DVI officers did,” Eve said vaguely. “Days later.”

“DVI?” Fuck, he didn’t want to know.

“Disaster Victim Identification.”

Zachary offered to carry her back to the hotel. Repeatedly. But Eve suspected her legs were steadier than his.

She’d had eleven years to come to terms with the bombings. Eleven years to learn to live with her scars and without her brother. Zachary had only minutes to comprehend the horrific details she’d shared with him. He was as shocked as she’d known he’d be.

The walk back was slow, very slow, because Zachary kept stopping, shaking his head and swearing.

“What happened after?”

“They flew me to Perth. The hospitals in Bali were full. They couldn’t cope with that kind of…devastation. My injuries were serious enough to get me on a plane, and my sister, who’s three years older, came with me. My parents stayed in Kuta to search for Lochie.” It no longer amazed her that she could discuss the bombings yet remain so distanced from it.

Her many hordes of therapists had helped her understand. The posttraumatic stress made it impossible for her to remember with anything besides emotional detachment. If she’d continued to relive it with such intense emotion—as she had for weeks and months after the explosions—she simply would not have been able to cope from day to day.

The disassociation was her way of getting on with her life. Accepting what had happened and moving on.

“Briana, my sister, faced endless press interviews. She didn’t exactly love them. They were…difficult. Upsetting. But she did them in case anyone recognized Lochlan and came forward with news about him. And when I was well enough, I was targeted by the press too. Not in a bad way. There was no harm intended. Just a need to show everyone how tragic, how terrible the bombings had been. But after…after they found my brother—” or what had been left of him, “—we couldn’t face the questions anymore. Couldn’t face the interviews. We asked for privacy, and they tried. They did. But every day it seemed there was that one reporter who got in, anyway. Who just had one small question for us.”

Zachary growled a throaty growl. “And I thought I’d had it bad with the press.”

“Don’t compare the two,” she told him logically. “That’s not fair to you. Your experience was different. They tried to crucify you. With me, my family, I think they were just as horrified by our experiences as we were. They looked for the human angle of the bombings. And their interest passed, in time. After the funeral.”

Pain stabbed her belly.

Okay, so Lochie’s death was the one thing she hadn’t learned to detach herself from. She still missed him every day.

Right, focus on something else. Anything else.

“That’s when I had my first vision,” she told him.

“After the bombs?”

“When I got back to Perth. They’d drugged me on the trip home because the pain was so bad. I woke up when they took me off the plane. Bree was there, holding my hand. Initially I thought I was still dreaming, because when the vision struck, it was one of me and Bree and Lochie playing when we were kids. They were building with Lego, and I was meticulously taking their buildings apart. But the memory wasn’t mine. It couldn’t have been. I was too young to remember it. Maybe only one or two.”

“You were seeing the memory from your sister’s perspective?”

“I was. It took a very long time for that realization to sink in. It made no sense at all. None. But every time Bree held my hand, something similar happened. And she held my hand a lot then. We needed each other. Needed that contact.”

“Did she know what was happening?”

“We discussed it, heaps. Decided it was just the drugs. I was on ridiculous painkillers, strong stuff. We both thought I was hallucinating. Tripping on the morphine or something.” Only she hadn’t been. And the visions weren’t limited to Bree. When a nurse took her pulse one morning, and held her hand in the process, Eve had suddenly seen identical twin boys in her mind.

Not understanding the power of what she’d seen and how she’d seen it, Eve had asked about the twins. The nurse had left without saying another word. Eve hadn’t seen her again.

“It took a while to figure the hand-holding triggered the visions, and even longer to recognize the symptoms—the tingles in my palm, the electricity shooting up my arm.” She shrugged. “I guess there’s no better teacher than experience.” That same experience had taught her to give up the affectionate practice of holding hands.

“How did you deal with it all? You were so damn young.”

“Therapy, Pacey. Years and years of counseling. I am very in touch with my inner child. She and I?” She held two fingers together. “We’re like this. Best mates.” Although the counselors had never understood the whole hand-holding-vision thing, and after a while she’d stopped talking about it. It had just been easier to keep that talent to herself instead of being subjected to their extensive psychoanalysis.

They reached the hotel and Zachary took her up to his suite. When the words and the conversation ran out, he spent the rest of the evening making slow, sweet love to her.

He handled her with such exquisite tenderness, Eve’s throat clogged with the tears she’d refused to shed while telling him about Bali.

He held her after, held her very close. “Thank you. For telling me about Bali. About your brother. For letting me in.”

Eve had never felt more adored, more protected. It had been a very long time since she’d spoken to anyone besides her family about Lochie, but telling Zachary had seemed…right. Something about him made her want to share her innermost thoughts, her emotions. She was, she knew, more than a little in love with the man. He’d burrowed into her heart and made a permanent place for himself there.

Which would have been perfectly wonderful if Eve didn’t know she still hid such a massive part of herself from him. Though she’d let him in and shared her trauma and her past, she’d still hidden her face. Zachary had yet to see the real Eve Andrews.

But did she need to show him her scars? Did she need to reveal the truly ugly side of herself? Couldn’t she just leave Zachary with the illusion that she wasn’t a monster?

Because as wonderful as he was and as beautifully as he held her now, this closeness between them, this love that she felt, could never lead anywhere.

In the end, Zachary was fated to be with another. She’d seen it in his vision—and it made her chest hurt now.

Eve knew, perhaps better than anyone, that visions were never wrong.

She lay with him for a long while, long after he’d fallen asleep, treasuring the time spent in his arms. When she could put it off no longer, when sleep tugged at her eyelids, she slipped from his bed, dressed and made her way to her own room.

When morning came and Zachary remembered the bath, Eve did not want to be near him. Not when the water he used to fill the tub could expose every one of the scars she’d chosen not to reveal.

It was Eve, all showered and made up, who banged on Zachary’s door the next morning. And when he opened it, looking sultry and sleepy, the sight of him made her heart leap straight into her throat.

He spent a good minute or two chastising her for leaving, and a good hour or two making love to her. But at ten they were forced to go their separate ways. Zachary had to prepare for the concert that night, and Eve had a birthday party she’d promised to attend—as a princess.

He kissed her thoroughly, promising to miss her the entire time they were apart. She left after pocketing a pair of Zachary’s green contact lenses, thinking they’d add a nice touch to her princess outfit, and smiling at how perfectly mushy her sexy drummer could be.

Then Jake drove her to her sister’s house, where Eve was drawn straight into the arms of her sister’s family. Bree left Hannah in her dad’s care, locked the two of them in her room, and as Eve transformed herself into a fairytale princess, complete with tiara, wig and Zachary’s contacts, Bree drilled her about roses, visions, blowjobs and Jonah Speed.

Zachary spent more than an hour missing his cues and fucking up one song after another.

His concentration was shot to hell, and damn it, he missed Eve. Wanted her with him. Wanted her beside him now. Today. And tomorrow. And the next day.

Jesus, he never wanted to be apart from her. That connection between them? It was stronger than ever.

As he banged an out-of-tune riff on his drums and was vaguely aware that the rest of the band had stopped to glare at him, he pictured Eve, motionless on the ground, shattered glass lying around her and a piece of the broken window lodged in her chest—saving her life in a grotesque twist of fate.

He missed a beat and dropped a drumstick as the imagined dark patch beside her became a pool of Eve’s blood.

Never had he felt so impotent. So fucking helpless. Eve had been injured in a bomb blast, lost her brother to the attack, and there was not a damn thing Zachary could do about it. Even now, Eve was the one who’d helped him deal with it. He hadn’t made a dime’s worth of difference—except to make her relive the whole fucking experience.

“Zachary!” It was Luke who snapped him back to reality.

He blinked.

The need to protect Eve, to keep her safe, had him itching. He never wanted to let her out of his sight again, never wanted her in a position where she could be a victim again.

And yet…and yet… Fuck, he’d made her a victim of a different kind. A victim of the paparazzi.

Yeah, big difference between a bomb blast and a kiss with a celebrity, but still.

“What the hell is going on with you this morning?” Luke demanded.

Zachary rubbed his now-empty fingers together. He swore he felt the stickiness of Eve’s blood on his hand.

“Take five,” the band manager said, looking around the room. “Get a drink, get a breath of fresh air, and be back here at 11:15.”

The room emptied, leaving just Zachary, his brothers and Luke.

Nathan gave him an assessing look. “You okay, bro?”

“I don’t think so.”

“You don’t look so,” Seth agreed.

“You look kind of like I felt when Sophie disappeared,” Nathan said quietly.

Luke narrowed his eyes. “Has Eve disappeared?”

“No. Not permanently. She’s at her sister’s now.”

“Did the press get hold of her?” Luke’s voice was low, threatening.

“Not that I know of.”

“This is about her?” Seth wanted to know.

Zachary nodded.

“Spill it, bro.” Nathan demanded. “Get it out so we can get on with the rehearsal.”

“She doesn’t have red hair.”

“Yep. We’d noticed that,” Luke said.

“Or green eyes,” Seth added.

“And yet…”

“And yet you’re in love with her.”

Zachary wasn’t sure who’d spoken. From the looks on the three men’s faces, it could have been any of them.

“Fucking head-over-heels crazy about her,” he agreed.

The second Zachary had realized Eve could have died in Bali, he’d felt it. So caught up was he in Eve’s story, he hadn’t understood it for what it was, but now he knew. He was deeply in love with the woman. The idea of a world without her made him want to punch someone. The idea of his world without her left him wheezing.

“And you don’t like the thought of that?” It was Seth who asked.

“It’s not that I don’t like it.” Not that at all. “It’s that I’m struggling to wrap my head around it.”

Luke and Nath were silent. Seth responded. “Must be messing with your mind. I’ve known Lucas was meant for me for eight years. If I suddenly realized there was someone else for me, I’d be…all fucked up.”

Luke opened his mouth then snapped it shut. A look of fierce possessiveness crossed his face.

“I am all fucked up,” Zachary admitted. Although not necessarily in a bad way. Falling in love with Eve wasn’t a negative. Not at all.

It was…well, fucking perfect. Filled him in a way he’d never been filled before. Not with any of the faceless women he’d slept with as Jonah, or the several girlfriends he’d had as Zachary.

Being with Eve felt right. It made him whole. He could see her beside him—for the rest of his life.

The bit that messed with his head was his vision, his fated woman. How could he feel this way about Eve if she wasn’t the woman he’d imagined for over twenty years? How could he have seen someone so clearly, if another woman stole his heart so completely?

It didn’t make a lick of sense.

Part of him, a very big part, was beginning to not care. He hadn’t given his red-haired vision much thought these last few days. His focus had been on Eve. All he cared about was Eve.

“Does this have to be so complicated?” Luke asked. “Can you not just take it for what it is and enjoy it? Enjoy Eve. Why even think about a woman who’s only real in your head?”

“Because she’s been his future for almost a lifetime, Lucas. It’s not that easy to suddenly envision something—someone—different.”

Seth, of all people, never let a future he’d dreamed about get away from him. He moved heaven and earth to make it happen.

Was Zachary willing to move heaven and earth to make the future he’d imagined for years happen?

He didn’t even have to think about the answer. Hell, no. Not now that Eve was in his life.

“Zachary?”

“Yeah, Nath?”

“Go to her.”

He stared at his brother.

“Go. Now. You’re doing fuck-all good around here. You might as well be with her.”

Luke gave a sigh of defeat and pulled out his cell phone. “Brayden?”

Five minutes later Zachary was in a car, headed to Eve’s sister’s place.

Chapter Twelve

Before climbing out of the car, Zachary shoved his sunglasses on.

He hadn’t stopped to put contacts in, hadn’t given it a thought. But he was going out in public, going to see people who knew him only as Jonah and not as Zachary. It was probably better to just hide his eyes than to face a barrage of questions.

The house Brayden pulled up at was small. A weatherboard building with a large yard of green grass and a low brick wall.

Dozens of little girls dressed as princesses and fairies sat in a circle, listening spellbound to someone in the middle, while a group of women, the girls’ mothers, he guessed, stood around a table or sat in chairs scattered through the yard.

None of them noticed as he climbed from the Merc and made his way to the party.

As he walked up the driveway he scanned the faces. Searched every mother there in hopes of spotting the woman he loved. He’d never had a problem attending parties before, but as he walked across the lawn, his stomach heaved.

He’d never attended a four-year-old girl’s party before. Well, not since he himself was four, and then it was by invitation only. Today, he was an adult, effectively gate-crashing a child’s birthday.

Good one, Zachary. Way to make an impression on the family.

The women spoke to one another while peals of delighted laughter rang through his ears. Young, innocent laughter.

He had not been that innocent in a very long time.

Zachary stopped to watch the kids, stopped to enjoy their innocence, and couldn’t help the smile that crept across his face. Nor could he stop the thought that crept into his mind. Eve, with a little girl at her side. One who looked just like her—and him.

The thought made him jerk in surprise. Where the hell had that come from?

He’d assigned all thoughts of possible offspring to a very distant part of his imagination after the whole baby scare. Yet the image of Eve with their child? Yeah, not so scary. Not scary at all.

Perhaps the only scary part was that the child did not have red hair or green eyes. Because that was what he’d always naturally assumed his children would look like.

It took a while for Zachary to realize the general conversation around him had ceased. The children still squealed and laughed, but all adult voices had suspiciously died.

The gazes of thirty-odd women prickled into his side, and Zachary was forced to turn and acknowledge them.

Some woman gaped openly, their jaws hanging down, their eyes wide. Some tried not to look at him so candidly but kept glancing his way nevertheless. Others blinked too fast, as though they couldn’t believe what they saw. Two women clung to each other and pointed at him.

Yeah, subtle, ladies.

A few mothers, standing by the table, seemed oblivious to his presence.

And then someone was marching towards him. Someone he recognized instantly. She wasn’t a dead ringer for Eve. Not by a long shot, but the similarity was still striking. Her hair was cut shorter, while Eve’s swung past her shoulders. This woman was older by a few years and a little heavier, although her body was still attractive.

The biggest difference though, was how cleanly scrubbed her face was.

Try though he might, Zachary couldn’t remember seeing Eve without makeup. Her sister had on none. Not even a hint of lipstick or mascara.

“Jonah Speed in my garden. Who’d have ever thunk it?” She stuck out her hand. “I’m Bree. Eve’s sister. And may I say, your pictures do you no justice whatsoever?”

He shook her hand tentatively. Last time he’d taken an Andrews sister’s hand in his, she’d zoned out on him. Or rather, zoned in on him. Very accurately. “Uh…thanks?”

“Of course thanks. I just complimented you. And don’t mind my hand. I won’t be seeing into your head. Just don’t possess the skill, I’m afraid.” She looked at the parcel he held under his other arm. “I’m guessing that’s not for me?”

“Nope, sorry.” Zachary offered the parcel to her nevertheless. It was wrapped in pink and purple paper with a matching pink and purple bow. At Zachary’s request, Brayden had stopped at a toy store on the way here, run inside empty-handed and run out with the gift, all prettily wrapped.

Neither Zachary nor Brayden had any idea what a Lalaloopsy was, but the store owner had assured Brayden it was perfect for a little girl.

He smiled at Bree. “Figured it would be rude to crash a party without a gift. Would you pass that on to your daughter for me?”

“Indeed I will. Thank you. I’m sure Hannah will love it.” She narrowed her eyes and peered carefully at him. “You falling for my little sister, Jonah?”

Jesus.

Just like her sibling, she headed straight for the jugular.

He swiped a hand through his hair. “Er…” What the fuck did he say to that? “Well, yes, ma’am. I believe I am.”

Ma’am? Seriously? The woman was the same age as him.

Behind Bree, whispers were starting, voices picking up, snippets of conversation drifting towards him.

“Jonah Speed!”

“Photos—and a video.”

“Briana’s sister.”

“Eve and Jonah…”

“Pashing on camera.”

“That’s nice,” Bree said with a smile. “Very nice indeed.” Then her smile disappeared and she leaned forward, looked up at him and said, “But if you hurt her, I promise to hunt you down and kill you. Slowly and painfully. Got it?”

Zachary almost snorted out loud. The idea that this diminutive woman could threaten him so openly was both amusing and sobering.

Amusing because she was the same size as Eve and, reasonably speaking, didn’t stand a chance against him in open combat, and sobering because it reinforced just how badly Eve had been hurt before.

Her sister simply would not allow it to happen again.

That did it for Zachary. He instantly liked Bree. “Got it. Loud and clear.”

She peered at him through narrowed eyes for a few more seconds, then nodded. “Good. Now, would you like some birthday cake?”

From fierce protector to charming hostess in a heartbeat. Zachary wondered if he’d ever understand women.

“I’d love some, thank you.” If it was chocolate, he’d save the piece for Eve. Okay, even if it wasn’t, he’d save it for Eve.

Bree turned and walked towards the table obviously expecting him to join her. He did, walking at her side. “Uh, is Eve around?”

“Sure.” She gestured over her shoulder. “Last time I looked she was busy with the kids.”

Zachary looked over Bree’s shoulder—and froze.

He blinked, then blinked again. Then sure he was hallucinating, blinked one more time.

Jesus, fuck.

He scrubbed his hand over his eyes, clearing the haze from them. But God help him, when he opened them again the very same sight greeted him.

“Holy shit! Jonah Speed?” A woman standing beside the birthday cake gasped. “Is it really you?”

Zachary nodded instinctively, only half aware of the question.

His attention was fully focused on the last thing he’d expected to see in Eve’s sister’s garden.

“Cripes. Can I have a photograph with you? Please? My niece is going to freak out when she discovers I met you.”

He should respond, should answer. Should even acknowledge the question, but his head just wasn’t in the game. How could it be? His whole world, his whole future had just been turned upside down.

“Oooh. Me too,” another voice squealed. “A piccie with you, and one of you alone? Please?”

And then his view was blocked as a small group of women surrounded him.

Again, Zachary acted on instinct, smiling when told to smile and placing his arm around one woman’s shoulder after the next. It hardly registered in his awareness.

Someone placed a pen in his hand, and he was signing his name to shirts and papers and napkins, trying his damn best not to let the tremor that shook his hand affect his handwriting.

He scrambled to act normal, tried frantically to behave as if his life threw him a massive curveball every day.

“What do you think of Australia?”

“Is it true, then, Jonah? You and Bree’s sister are an item?”

Hell, yeah, it was true. He and Eve were an item, and if he had anything to say about it, he’d make them a permanent item.

Or so he’d thought two minutes ago. But that was before. Before he’d seen what he still couldn’t believe he’d seen.

“Is Jamie coming to the party too?”

“And Jordan?”

“Have you met Hannah before? Does she know who you are?”

Shit, couldn’t these people move away, give him space? Let him confirm what he’d seen?

“Ladies. Let’s let Jonah catch his breath. He’s looking a little shell-shocked from all your attention.”

Thank you, Bree.

Not that Jonah was shocked from the attention. He was used to it. Thirty women clambering around him hardly featured as a blip on his radar.

But there was no denying he was shell-shocked. No denying his heart pounded like a fucking freight train. No doubt that his life had just changed forever.

Jesus, fate was a bitch.

Either that, or she had a seriously sick sense of humor.

Bree must have cleared the women from around him, because suddenly a path opened up, leaving him with an unobstructed view of none other than the woman he’d waited his whole life to meet.

The red-haired, green-eyed beauty he’d seen in his vision.

She stood right there, laughing, enchanting the group of girls who surrounded her. Her red hair flowed over her shoulders in lustrous waves, and her green eyes snapped with joy.

Jesus, she was even more beautiful in the flesh than she’d been in his imagination. She took his breath.

Her laughter tinkled through the air like the peal of a small bell, and every fantasy Zachary had ever had about her came crashing back to haunt him. He was assaulted by pure exhilaration, stunned confusion and complex horror.

Twenty-four years he’d thought about her. Twenty-four long, lonely years.

And the minute he finally decided to give up on her, finally decided his future lay with someone else—with a woman he’d met just days ago yet fallen irrevocably in love with—she made an appearance in his life.

Oh, yeah, fate was a bitch all right. A crazy bitch, who must be sitting somewhere, laughing raucously.

She’s out there now, quietly waiting,

Red hair, green eyes…fascinating.

His grandmother’s song reverberated through his head.

There would be no more waiting. That time was officially over. She was out there now. Red hair, green eyes. And fuck, yeah. She was fascinating.

He couldn’t deny it, couldn’t look away.

And when she looked up and caught him staring, her smile broke into a huge grin meant only for him.

He was so fucked. So absolutely and completely fucked.

Yeah, he loved Eve. Yeah, he wanted a future with her. But fucking hell, the future he’d anticipated his entire life now stood in front of him, grinning. Smiling the smile he’d seen a million times in his mind.

“She’s gorgeous, isn’t she?” It was Bree who asked. Bree who stood beside him.

“More beautiful than anything I’ve seen in my whole life,” he agreed. Although he wasn’t sure that was really true. She was beautiful. No two ways about it. Striking. Stunning. But she was no more beautiful than Eve.

Bree said something else, but all Zachary heard were her words from earlier. If you hurt my little sister, I promise to hunt you down and kill you. Slowly and painfully.

Jesus, he didn’t want to hurt Eve. The thought alone about killed him. But how did he reconcile his feelings for her with his feelings for his red-haired fate?

Hadn’t his grandmother’s predictions come true for Nathan, Seth and Luke?

How did he now change his fate, when she stood before him, smiling?

“Sing us another song,” one of the children begged. “Please, Princess Eve. Sing us a song.”

His red-haired beauty flashed him one last smile, then clapped her hands and turned back to the girls. In seconds they’d formed a circle around her, and while she sang a tune he recognized from one of the Disney movies, the kids danced around her.

He watched, spellbound, as she charmed the girls.

Watched spellbound as she sang to them. Her voice was sweet, lyrical. But it wasn’t her singing that held them all rapt. It was her sheer joy in entertaining them. Her delight in making the girls smile and laugh.

It was almost magical.

His red-haired beauty, Princess Eve with the sparkly tiara in her hair, was born to make children happy.

Wait.

What the…

Princess Eve?

She waved at him.

Zachary’s jaw dropped. He blinked. Then blinked again, and then again. Then he scrubbed his hand over his eyes to clear his hazy vision as the next few lines of his grandmother’s lullaby rang through his ears.

Appearances fool, you have been warned,

Follow your instinct, don’t be torn.

And as he looked at her once again, the clouds parted from a part of his brain he hadn’t realized they’d been shadowing, and sunlight poured through the space, enlightening him.

Holy crap.

Princess Eve.

He slapped his head as the pieces of a puzzle he’d never solved before fell into place. His heart leapt, as though charged by an electric pulse.

Princess Eve, the red-haired beauty of his vision was her. Eve. Tiny. The woman he’d fallen in love with. His fate and his love were one and the same. He’d just been too focused on the red hair and green eyes to see the similarity in the facial structure. Although she was taller than usual, by a good few inches. But that could be explained away by a pair of heels. And her lips looked different—the color was off. They were a bright orange he’d never seen on her. And her cheekbones were more pronounced—but that was obviously a trick of the makeup.

Princess Eve removed the tiara from her head and placed it on one of the girls. Hannah?

Zachary didn’t know. He didn’t care. Because as he stared at his present and his future, she beckoned to him, calling him over. And in that second, Eve was the redhead who’d beckoned to him in his vision. It was the exact moment he’d seen, over and over as his grandmother had sung to him, the moment he’d immortalized in his mind.

His heart flipped, his chest tightened, and for the first time ever, Zachary felt complete. Contentment, happiness, excitement and anticipation filled him as he realized there was no longer anything standing in the way of his—and Eve’s—happily ever after.

No wonder the connection he’d instantly felt with Eve had been so strong. No wonder her recollections of the Bali bomb had gutted him. He’d felt her pain because she was his fate. His soul mate.

His.

He walked towards her, dazed, and she stilled to watch him approach. For once he was content not to touch her, not to haul her tight against him. All he wanted to do was stare. Look at her until he’d finally had his fill. He stopped a mere inch away and gazed into her deep, green eyes. Eyes that now looked suspiciously like his and his brothers’ when they performed.

And then he couldn’t help it. He smiled. Just let a goofy grin spread across his face.

Eve smiled right back.

“It’s you.” His voice reflected his wonder and his enchantment. “It was you all along.”

This time, it wasn’t her own cheek she ran her fingers down, it was his, and he felt her touch all the way through to his heart.

Her green eyes shimmered with emotion. “It is, Zachary. It’s me.”

And that was all they had time to say before a mob of mothers, armed with cameras and questions, surrounded them.

Many long hours later, Eve stood beneath the spray of the shower, letting the grime and sweat from the concert wash down the drain.

Try though she had, Eve had been unable to keep her eyes off Jonah the entire duration of the concert. She’d had to force herself to focus on Delilah and Devine, force herself to ensure their makeup was perfect, because all she wanted to do was devour the man she loved with her gaze. And when the man she loved got onstage and became Jonah Speed, he was a sight to behold. Breathtaking. Magnificent.

They hadn’t had a minute to themselves the entire day. Bree’s friends had crowded around him during the party, not giving him a minute to breathe, then Bree and Anthony had insisted he stay for lunch, and Hannah had insisted he help her open presents.

Even four-year-olds, it seemed, were spellbound by Zachary.

Luke had phoned around three, demanding Zachary get back to the hotel, and Eve had followed about an hour later. Jake had gotten her to the arena, dressed once again as Eve, with time to spare and no interruptions from the press.

But cameras had flashed backstage. And more than one photographer had caught Eve and Zachary together. Not kissing this time—just talking when they found two minutes to be together and alone. Eve strongly suspected a kiss wasn’t necessary to capture her feelings for him on film. Every time she looked at Zachary, she knew her eyes turned all gooey and her lips wouldn’t stop smiling.

Eve was no fool. She’s seen her reflection in the mirror this morning. It hadn’t occurred to her before, not at any point, that she might be the woman from Zachary’s vision. But a mirror didn’t lie. And when she’d seen his face, seen his reaction as he’d stared at her made up as a princess, she’d known for certain.

It was her. She was Zachary’s fate.

The water splashed over her hair and in her ears, deafening her, so when two arms encircled her waist from behind, she jumped a good half a meter in the air.

“Easy, Tiny,” Zachary soothed. “It’s just me.”

The blood drained from her face. Every muscle in her body went lax. “H-how did you get inside my room?”

She’d felt safe removing her mask. Safe behind her locked door. But now Zachary was here, with her, in the shower. With her and her unpainted face.

He chuckled a low, sexy chuckle that echoed through her belly and made her groin clench with need. “Simple abuse of power,” he confessed. “I charmed the woman at reception into giving me a spare card for your door.”

He pulled her against him, his chest to her back, his erection nestled against her ass. And God help her, Eve was ready for him. Hot, aroused and achy with desire.

She was also absolutely terrified. Her hands quivered so bad she had to clasp them together.

“You…” She cleared her throat, finding it hard to talk. “You are incorrigible, Zachary Pace.”

God, she so wasn’t ready for this. So wasn’t ready to expose herself to him. Not now, when everything should be so perfect between them. Not when she’d just discovered she was his fate.

Not now, when she was so in love with him she almost couldn’t breathe from all that emotion crammed into her chest.

How could everything she’d never dared dream about fall in her lap, making her the luckiest, happiest woman on earth, only to be torn away when Zachary saw the real her?

“I wasn’t Zachary down there. I was Jonah. Desperate to get to my drumsticks, which I’d accidentally left in your room earlier.”

“Just admit it. You turned on the full power of your sexual prowess, and the woman fell over herself offering you the card.” Her voice was as shaky as her hands. Could he tell?

He chuckled again, sending an erotic shiver down her spine. “Maybe.” He nipped her ear. “She may have offered me a key to every room on the floor.”

“Poor thing didn’t stand a chance.” Now her voice shook even more. Partly from fear that he’d turn her around, and partly because his hands had wandered over her front, feathering over her breasts, down her belly, around and up her sides only to find her breasts again.

“We going to talk about a woman whose name I can’t even remember?” He leaned in and pressed a kiss to her neck. Water pounded her front, slipping down her skin and over his hands. “Or are we going to acknowledge what happened at your sister’s place?”

She held her breath as he brushed a thumb over her left nipple, making it harden instantly, and dropped his hand to her groin, letting his other thumb find her clit.

“You’re the woman of my vision.” His amazement was audible. “The redhead I’ve waited almost my entire life to meet.” He rocked his hips, letting his erection settle between her buttocks, slide against the tender skin there.

“I never…thought…never realized. Until I put the wig on.” Her heart had beat like crazy at her reflection. Even Bree had asked her what was wrong.

“A wig.” Zachary laughed and strummed her clit with his thumb. “Who would have thought that was all it would take?”

Eve saw stars. Her pussy filled with moist heat as the spray of warm water and his touch combined to make her dizzy. Not a good thing. Not good at all, seeing as she held her breath, praying to God he didn’t turn her around. Not now. Not yet.

She knew as soon as he did, whatever they’d built between them would come crashing down. Knew that while Zachary might have accepted her chest scar with ease, her face was another story. A grotesque, ugly story that no man in her life to date had been able to accept. Why would he be different? Why would she expect him to be?

“Wig, a ton of colored makeup I don’t usually wear, heels and a pair of your lenses,” she corrected.

“You know the irony about that? I was the one who insisted we wear green lenses. It was my way of keeping my redhead in my present.”

So if he hadn’t, she’d never have put them in, and never have become his fated vision. The thought stunned her.

“Know what else is funny?” He rubbed small, sinful circles around her clit, making her gasp. “If Nath hadn’t told me to come and find you, if the guys hadn’t insisted I ditch practice and get to your sister’s place, I’d never have seen you dressed like her. I’d never have known.”

One coincidence after the other had led them to that moment at Hannah’s party.

But maybe it would have been better if Zachary had never come there. Never seen her dressed up that way. Maybe then they’d never have reached this point, with him on the verge of meeting the real Eve.

A part of her, a part that made her sick to the stomach, knew she and Zachary existed on borrowed time. Their affair was as close to over as an affair could get. But she wasn’t ready to say goodbye. Wasn’t ready to let him go. God, she’d never be ready to let him go.

Just a few more minutes with him. Please.

One more chance to make love.

He was ready. So very firmly, thickly ready. She was too. Achy and needy, for him.

One more time to feel him move inside her, and then Eve would give him up for good, give him his freedom.

But not just yet. Please, God, not just yet.

“Know what else is funny?” He plucked at her nipples, first one then the other, and slid his finger down to her slit, let it slip over her swollen folds, making her pant and shiver. “I’d given up on her. On my redhead. Decided I no longer wanted or needed her. The reason I came to the party was to tell you I’d fallen in love with you. Fallen so damn hard, my vision no longer meant anything to me.”

His words caught her in her chest, making her breath falter.

Zachary loved her? Eve? Not the redhead? Her?

She hiccupped and then coughed, not quite able to catch her breath.

“Hey, are you okay?”

Eve nodded, too choked up to speak.

He buried his face in her neck, nuzzled his way up to her ear. “Know how you feel. Seeing you at your sister’s, my love and my fate all melded into one person? Jesus, I don’t know how I held it together. Don’t know how I remained upright. My legs almost gave out on me.”

Oh, God, he was killing her. One beautiful word at a time. Breaking her heart into tiny pieces.

By the time he finally saw her face, Eve figured her heart would be just as badly scarred. The difference? Her face had healed. Hideously, but it had healed. She didn’t think her heart would ever get over losing Zachary Pace.

Chapter Thirteen

“Tiny?” His heart clenched. “Baby? Are you…are you crying?” Zachary tried to turn her around, get her to face him.

“I-ignore me.” She wouldn’t let him move her, wouldn’t show him her face. “It’s just…n-no one has ever told me he loved me before.”

Bullshit.

Impossible.

Men must have fallen at her feet, confessing their love.

“A-and hearing you say it? It’s like a dream, Zachary. A dream I know I’m going to have to wake up from, because it’s just too damn amazing to be real.”

“It’s no dream, sweetheart,” he reassured her. “I’m not just in love. I’m freaking nuts about you. I wouldn’t be here if I wasn’t. Wouldn’t go crazy when you weren’t around if I felt any other way.” And yeah, he’d been a little crazy this morning, needing to see her—when they’d just spent the preceding two hours making love.

He caressed her pussy, loved her wetness around his fingers, her beaded nipples beneath his palm. Loved that even in a hot shower, with warm water cascading over them, Eve’s skin was covered in goose bumps.

His cock pulsed between her buttocks. One day, very soon, he’d make love to her there. But for now, he just needed to be inside her, needed to be in her pussy, be a part of the woman he loved. The woman he’d looked forward to finding his whole life. “I waited twenty-four years to meet you, and then fell in love with you without knowing who you really were.”

“We met two days ago. Do you think you really know me? Every part of me?”

The uncertainty in her voice stabbed at his heart, and he cursed whatever moron had come before him, refusing to declare his love to this woman. Asshole.

“I know enough of you to realize I want to spend the rest of time with you. I’ve waited long enough for this moment. Fuck knows I don’t want to wait another second.”

A soft moan escaped Eve’s throat, and for long seconds Zachary was incapable of speech. How could he talk when Eve rubbed herself against his hand? When her hot, swollen pussy grabbed at his finger as he slid it inside her, trying to hold him there? When the muscles of that hot, swollen pussy made his need to fuck her almost intolerable?

Loath to release her breasts, Zachary dropped his other arm to her waist so he could give her the full benefit of his touch. With one hand he fucked her, relishing the way her pussy clenched at his finger, and with the other he teased her clit, caressing it with ever-increasing pressure, rubbing tiny circles around it, over and over, as the spray poured over them.

Streams of water coursed through her hair, down her back, pooling between their bodies. He licked at her neck, catching some of the drops with his tongue, then closed his lips over a particularly sweet spot and sucked.

Eve came with a loud groan, her pussy pulsing rhythmically. A soft keening filled the shower stall. Eve’s soft keening.

It caught him in his balls, made his dick even harder.

Thank fuck he’d had the foresight to put on a condom before stepping inside the shower, because God knew there was no chance he’d have the strength to stop what he was doing and find protection now.

He let her ride his fingers, ride her orgasm, until her inner muscles eased and her body relaxed against his. Then he took an arm in each hand, leaned her upper body forward and flattened her palms against the wall.

He had to bite back a roar as the position pressed her ass even tighter against his dick, then had to bite back another as he slid clear of her buttocks.

Fuck, she felt good. But not as good as she’d feel wrapped around him, her wet heat enveloping his shaft.

Zachary positioned himself at the entrance to her pussy, and with one thrust, found heaven. Her muscles clamped down on him, holding him inside all that feminine heat.

Once buried inside her, Zachary was forced to stop, to breathe—very deeply—and count to ten. If he thrust again anytime soon, he’d come. Lose his load in her depths.

Yep, they’d made love before, and yeah, it had been good. But this? Now? Sublime. Zachary wasn’t just making love to the woman he’d fallen for over the last few days. He made love to the woman he’d wanted his whole life.

They were one and the same.

He tried to hold himself at a distance, tried to grasp her by her hips and plunge inside her while standing upright. But God help him, he couldn’t do it. How the fuck could any man hold back when the woman he loved stood before him?

He leaned in, pressing his back to her front, and wrapped his arms around her waist, holding her as close as a man could hold a woman. He buried his nose in her neck, let the water pour over her shoulders and his, and rocked into his woman, once, twice, a million times.

He heard the music in his mind. He always heard music when they made love, but Zachary didn’t tap out the rhythm on her skin. Tapping meant he’d have to spend seconds not touching her. Every time he raised his hand would be a second away from her flesh.

And for now, hell, maybe forever, Zachary found himself powerless to release her.

“I love you, Eve.” He didn’t whisper. He needed her to hear him over the spray. “Love you so goddamn much it hurts not to touch you.”

The muffled sound that came from her could have been a moan or a sob. Zachary wasn’t sure. What he was sure about was Eve’s response to his words and his actions.

Again gooseflesh covered her skin. Her nipples were so tight they poked at his palms, and as hard as he drove into her, so she rocked back on him, meeting every thrust with a delicious twist of her hips. “Don’t stop, Zachary. Please, God, just don’t stop.”

Loving her? Or fucking her?

The first one she need never worry about. The second? Yeah, he’d be forced to stop soon—but only because the sensation was too damn incredible, the urge too strong. He was going to come.

His orgasm built, sent him hurtling towards his peak. “Wanna stay like this forever. Never want this to end…but…too…damn…good!”

He thrust harder, deeper. His balls tightened at the base of his dick.

“Z-Zachary!” Her cry was breathless.

Harder, deeper still. Shit, he wasn’t going to last.

“Oh, God, Zachary!”

Eve came, her pussy spasming around his shaft. Great tremors ripped through her body, and she sobbed his name again and again.

It was all too much. Sensory overload. Undiluted bliss.

He climaxed. So fucking hard, the force of his orgasm almost knocked him off his feet.

Jesus, he’d never experienced anything like this. Never wanted a woman so much he hurt. Never wanted to make love to a woman all over again, while still coming inside her.

Never wanted to hold onto anyone so tight she never left his side.

Never… Not until he’d met Eve.

When the last shudder of his release had passed and her pussy pulsed no more, when only the sound of their heavy breathing mixed with the splattering of water on the floor, Zachary pulled out of her and spun her around. Without even opening his eyes his lips found hers, and he kissed Eve soundly for a very, very long time.

It was the taste of salt on his tongue that finally ended the kiss. The taste that forced him to pull away.

Tears? Still?

Opening his eyes wasn’t easy. His lids were so heavy, so sated—just like the rest of him—that focusing his gaze was almost impossible.

But when he managed, when Eve’s face finally converged into a solid shape, it wasn’t her tears that had him gasping out loud.

Zachary blinked, hard. Then he blinked again.

Okay, so his vision hadn’t cleared yet. Obviously water obstructed his view. Still holding her tight, he stepped back, out of the range of the spray, and ran his hand over his eyes, drying them as best he could.

But damn it, when he opened them again, his vision was no clearer.

Or maybe it was altogether too fucking clear.

“Eve…” His voice was a hoarse rasp. “Jesus—”

She looked trapped, terrified. Just like earlier, at Hannah’s party, her eyes shimmered with emotion. Only this emotion tore a hole through his stomach and made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. There was nothing happy about it.

My scars.

Christ, she’d referred to them in plural, hadn’t she? And all he’d seen was one. How could he not have realized? Not have seen what lay beneath the expertise of her makeup?

What he stared at now was not one scar. Not even close. There must have been forty crisscrossing the side of her face, a crazy network of pink lines, some thicker than others, some longer. Some were bordered by tiny pink dots—leftover marks from stitches?—and some were slim enough to almost be unnoticeable.

Yet they meshed together to form a pattern, as though a child had taken a permanent pink marker and scribbled across her cheek at will.

Shock kept his muscles frozen just long enough for reality to set in. But once Zachary understood what he was seeing, once he knew the exploding glass had not just scarred her chest, he couldn’t control the violent tremors that shook his body.

He dropped his hands, freeing Eve, and stumbled back against the wall of the shower. His knees shook so damn hard he didn’t think they’d hold his weight.

There it was again. That unfathomable depth of emotion he always felt around her. Only now he fathomed it. Now he knew why it ran so deep. Eve was his fate. Eve—and all her scars. Her hurt and pain were his.

Zachary closed his eyes and fought the weakness that claimed his limbs. It took long seconds, long minutes maybe, before his arms finally steadied and his legs solidified. But his shock did not wear off. Pain tore at his stomach, and he wrapped his arm around his waist, uselessly trying to ward it off.

Plagued by what he’d seen, and lacking the lung capacity to express his horror, Zachary rolled his hands into fists and without turning around, slammed them, once, twice, twenty times, into the wall behind him.

Eve did not hang around to watch Zachary beat the walls in disgust. Still dripping from the shower, she tugged the first thing she saw from her suitcase—a sundress that fell down to her knees—threw it on, grabbed her keycard and escaped.

Got the hell out of that hotel room, and ran as far and as fast as she could. She raced down the corridor and didn’t bother with the elevator, finding the stairs instead and tearing down them, taking them two or three at a time.

She charged through the lobby and rammed through the doors of the hotel. Flashes of light blinded her, but Eve paid them no heed. Barefoot and desperate, she sprinted away.

Voices called her name. More lights flashed, but she left them behind quickly. Someone might have followed her. There were footsteps for a while, mimicking hers, but she just ran faster until the rhythmic thud behind her ceased.

Stones and pebbles sliced into the soles of her feet. She didn’t care. A few more scars could hardly hurt her now. She stopped running only when she reached the beach, and then only when she found a protective alcove of rocks to huddle beside.

God knew it wasn’t safe, a woman alone on the beach at this time, but Eve was already damaged. There was nothing that could damage her more.

Twice she’d been rejected after revealing her face to the men she’d thought she might have a future with, and both times the disappointment had crushed her.

But neither of them had taken one look at her scars and been repulsed enough to turn white. Neither of them had clutched their stomachs and pounded the wall in abject horror.

Zachary Pace, with all his vows of love and affection, all his talk of fate and future, had done what no one else before him had done. Been too nauseated by her face to even look at her. He’d closed his eyes and shut her out—completely.

Chapter Fourteen

Bree stood in her kitchen trying to get Eve to eat something. After helping her bathe and bandage her feet, she’d set toast and jam on a plate in front of her, cereal with milk, scrambled eggs and finally, in sheer desperation, leftover birthday cake.

Same with the drinks. There were glasses of water and orange juice, a mug of coffee and a cup of tea, all sitting beside a bottle of red wine.

Eve’s stomach turned at the idea of putting anything in it.

She knew she looked terrible. Frightening even. The early-morning jogger who’d lent her his mobile phone had tried not to gawk but failed miserably.

Bree had pulled up beside her fifteen minutes later, bundled her into the car and taken Eve back to the house. It had taken a while, but finally Eve choked out the full story, telling Bree everything.

Her sister’s face still shone with murderous rage.

“Can you get a message to the hotel, Bree?”

“Of course. I can do anything you need me to.”

“Phone them and ask to speak to Delilah Young. If they put you through, great. If not, just leave a message.” They wouldn’t put her through. The hotels had strict instructions to take messages for the band members, not connect the calls.

“And the message is?”

“Tell her I’ll meet them in Adelaide, at the arena. I’ll be there in time to do makeup.”

Bree stared at her. “You’re not going back, are you?”

“I have to. I signed up for a six-month tour. I have a professional obligation. Can’t back out now.”

“Er, yeah, you can. You can back the hell out, and no one will call you on it. Not a single person.”

“My…problem is with Zachary. Jonah.” Her chest closed at the mention of his name. “Not Delilah and Devine. They’ve been nothing but lovely to me.”

“They’re part of Speed, Evie. Part of Jonah’s band. You don’t have to go back. Not after what that bastard did to you.”

“I spent the first few days of the tour without any contact with him. It won’t be hard to avoid him for the rest of it.”

“You can’t evade a man for six months.”

“I won’t need to.” Eve shrugged, a world of pain in that small movement. “He’ll be dodging me like the plague.”

Bree’s hands curled into fists. She let rip with a few choice expletives that made Eve snort.

“Look, Mum.” Hannah’s excited voice echoed through from the lounge room. “Aunty Evie’s on the telly again.”

“Oh, fuck.” Bree gave voice to Eve’s thoughts.

Limbs heavy, she made her way to the TV.

“Jonah Speed’s latest love interest, Bali bomb survivor, Eve Andrews, was seen tearing out of her hotel late last night, looking none too happy.”

And there she was, racing from the hotel lobby, her mangled, tragic face visible to the whole world.

The reporter kept on speaking as images of Eve flashed across the screen. Pictures of her just after the attacks, her face and chest swathed in bandages. Images of her and Bree leaving the hospital arm in arm, a shot of Lochie’s funeral, the video footage of her and Zachary kissing, then pictures of them talking backstage at the concert last night.

And then back to her fleeing the hotel, cameras closing in on her back as she raced down the street.

She didn’t hear what the reporter said. Didn’t listen. She didn’t want to know. Whether it was the truth or not, Eve’s injuries—both her physical and emotional ones—had just been revealed to the entire world. Again.

Suddenly weary to the bone, Eve collapsed onto the couch. Devastation and lack of sleep overwhelmed her. She couldn’t keep her eyes open. Didn’t want to. Didn’t want to think, not for one more second, about Zachary Pace.

Bree hoisted her up, helped her to the spare room and tucked her into bed. Eve was asleep before Bree had closed the blinds.

When she opened her eyes later that afternoon, she felt no better. Exhaustion still dogged her, and her body ached as though she’d been hit by a truck. She threw the covers off, made her way to the bathroom, and once there, took the time to run a comb through her hair, a toothbrush over her teeth and a facecloth over her face.

She didn’t bother with makeup. No amount of preening would make her feel better. And besides, Eve wasn’t in the mood for covering up her scars. Not today. She didn’t even wince when she looked in the mirror. They were a part of her. It was time to accept that.

Looking and feeling a mess, she went in search of her sister.

She didn’t find her. What she did find, looking almost as bad as she felt, was Zachary. He sat on the couch she’d collapsed into earlier, his face as pale as hers.

His hair was a mess, and a smudge of blood had dried beneath his nose. He looked at her through one eye. The other was an angry red and in the process of swelling shut.

She blinked, looked at him again, just to be sure it really was him sitting there, then turned her back and walked to the kitchen.

Her stomach still wasn’t ready to accept food. If anything, it felt worse now, after seeing Zachary, than it had earlier. But her throat was parched, her mouth dry, and the orange juice she’d refused before now seemed very appealing.

Frankly, anything seemed appealing, as long as it was in another room, far away from him.

Her arms trembled as she poured the juice, and she had to lift the glass with two hands to ensure she didn’t spill any of it. The drink was cool as it slid down her throat, and the tart sweetness washed away the bitter taste in her mouth.

Zachary followed her to the kitchen without a word. He didn’t follow her inside, just leaned against the doorpost, grateful for its support.

She was okay. Unharmed and okay.

For the first time since he’d seen her real face, Zachary felt a measure of peace.

“I thought I’d never see you again.” He suspected anything louder than a whisper would startle her. Or maybe startle him. “You vanished so completely, I couldn’t find you.” He’d searched, frantically. Had every bodyguard and member of hotel security searching for her too. They’d scoured the hotel and marina, checked every road in a five-mile radius and come up empty.

Eve did not acknowledge his comment in any way.

“I-I thought something terrible had happened to you.” Something terrible had happened to her. “And when…when there was no sign of you, anywhere… The fear…” Jesus, it had almost crippled him.

Eve poured herself another glass of juice and drank it down.

“We looked everywhere, Tiny.” Everywhere. And doing it without the paparazzi noticing had been impossible.

“I headed over here at first light.” The phone call in the middle of the night had proved fruitless—and had scared the living shit out of Bree. She’d hung up on him when he’d told her why Eve had run.

Eve placed the bottle back in the fridge, closed it and walked over to the sink. She didn’t turn to look at him, and she didn’t respond to his words.

“Your sister tried to run me over as she left the house to get you.” He almost snorted at the memory. She’d been climbing into her car as he’d approached, and when she saw him, she’d gunned the engine and reversed out of her garage so fast, Zachary had been forced to jump clear of her bumper. “She very nearly succeeded.”

Eve washed her glass and set it on the stand to dry.

“Anthony wasn’t quite as aggressive. He just ordered my ass off his property and told me never to blacken it again.”

She stared out the window, then stepped back, shaking her head in disgust, obviously noticing the crowd that had gathered outside: news vans, photographers and reporters holding mics. They’d followed him here the second time around.

Maybe one day she’d get used to it. He hoped to God she would, because if she stayed with him, she’d be hounded by them continually.

“I left. But only because I knew you’d be in good hands. And only long enough to get back to the hotel and call off the search. Then I came back.” With Brayden and Jake, at Luke’s insistence. “To get you.”

But neither Bree nor Anthony would let him anywhere near the front door, and he’d been forced to sit in the car with the bodyguards, biding his time. Forced to ignore the constant knocking on the window from the story-hungry reporters who’d followed him here. Forced to drive around the block a hundred times over.

A few hours later, after Anthony had gone to work and Bree was playing with Hannah in the yard, pretending the media wasn’t shadowing her house, Zachary had approached her again.

He’d hadn’t see her fist coming. It had slammed into his eye before he’d realized she’d thrown a punch. The second fist had landed on his nose, and the third in his stomach.

Apparently Bree had lied when she’d threatened to kill him slowly if he ever hurt Eve. There was nothing slow about the speed of her car or her punches.

Only he’d never meant to hurt Eve, hadn’t done it intentionally, and it had taken some fast talking to prove as much to Bree. “I had to convince your sister I wasn’t here to hurt you again. Had to swear on my brothers’ lives. She wouldn’t let me near you.” As the press had taken great delight in showing the world, over and over again.

Hannah giggled every time a news report showed Bree giving him a bloody nose.

“Where is my sister?” Eve asked. She sounded so…detached.

“She left. About thirty minutes ago. Took Hannah to a swimming lesson.” Christ, he wished Eve would turn around, acknowledge him.

“And left you alone with me? Interesting. Did she leave a bowl as well?”

“A bowl?”

“In case you throw up at the sight of me. I’d hate for you to dirty Bree’s floor.”

Her barb hurt worse then Bree’s punches. Way worse. “I guess I deserved that.”

Eve shrugged. “Whatever. Could you leave, please? Tell Delilah and Devine I’ll see them in Adelaide tomorrow night.”

“I can’t. They’re already in Adelaide.” Or they were on the plane at any rate.

“Then you’d better hurry up and go join the band. It won’t do for Jonah to be split up from Speed.”

Jesus, he couldn’t stand the iciness in her demeanor. It made him crazy. “Were you ever going to tell me, Eve? Ever going to show me your scars voluntarily? Or were you just going to let me go on believing the only part of you that had been injured was your chest?”

“Go away, Zachary. I don’t want to talk to you, I don’t want to discuss my scars, and let me be perfectly clear, I sure as hell do not want to discuss my scars with you.”

“Ah, so it’s fine for you to put me on the spot. Fine for you to ask the questions I don’t want to answer. But God forbid you should have to tackle the difficult ones.”

“Fuck you, Zachary.”

“No, Eve. Fuck you. For keeping that from me. For holding back such a vital piece of information about yourself. You fucking stripped me bare. Made me come clean with every sordid detail of my past.” His face burned, the anger and the rage erupting to the surface. “Oh, I’m sorry, Zachary,” he mimicked. “It’s none of my business seeing inside your head, Zachary. I shouldn’t have brought that up, Zachary. But damn it, you went there anyway. Wherever it was, you just zoned right in and fucking demanded answers. Demanded the truth.”

He was shouting and had to force himself to modulate his voice. Not for Eve though. There was no way was he sharing this with every fucking news reporter in Australia. “What gives you the right to look into my life, to expose my soul and then refuse to expose yours in return?”

“Oh, so it’s my fault? I’m the one to blame? That’s rich, Pace. Just fucking priceless. You profess to love me, profess to have waited your whole life to meet me, and when you finally do meet me, when you finally get to see the real me, the real Eve Andrews, not the mask I show the world, you can’t fucking handle it.” She grabbed the closest thing to her, a plastic container sitting on the drying rack by the sink and flung it at him, hard.

The Tupperware hurtled through the air, hit him on the head and dropped to the ground.

He winced. Fuck! How could plastic hurt so much?

“Pick it up, Zachary. Hold it in front of you, so the next time the sight of my face makes you want to be sick, you’ll be prepared.” She turned to glare at him, hands on her hips, eyes blazing.

The scars on her face stood out, pink against her red cheeks. He couldn’t stop staring, couldn’t tear his gaze away.

“I’m hideous. I know. Grotesque. Repulsive. A freak, a monster. An abomination.” She counted the words off on her fingers. “I’ve been called them all. Doesn’t matter how many treatments I’ve had to make the scars less obvious, I still can’t hide them. Can’t avoid them. So don’t be shy. Add your descriptions to the list. Believe me, the name-calling hurts a lot less than watching the man I love close his eyes so he won’t have to tolerate the sight of me.”

“You think I reacted like I did because I find you repulsive?” He moved on instinct, hadn’t even realized he’d left the support of the doorframe until his hands were wrapped around her arms. “You think I think you’re…a…monster?” The very description made him want to be sick.

“I don’t think. I know.” She pulled her arms back, tried to yank them from his grip, but he refused to let go. Hell, he was never letting go of her again.

She howled in frustration, yanked harder and then gave up, panting. “When the man who’s just fucked you senseless reels at the sight of you, it’s a dead giveaway.”

Zachary saw red. “Okay, we are going to get one thing straight. You’re going to stop fighting me, stop yelling at me, and you’re going to listen.”

She didn’t stop, just kept thrashing her arms, trying to get free.

In sheer desperation, Zachary marched her backward to the fridge, pinned her against it and held her in place with his own body, his flush against hers.

“I don’t think you’re a freak, a monster, an abomination or any of those other…foul words you used to describe yourself. I don’t think it now, and I didn’t think it last night. You are not grotesque and you are not repulsive. But if you think I could have seen your real face for the first time and not reacted, then you badly misjudged me.”

“I did not misj—”

He pushed his body against her harder, squashing her chest. She needed only enough air to breathe, not to talk. Because if she spoke, if she argued, she wouldn’t hear him, and damn it, he needed her to hear him.

“I did not close my eyes because I found you…grotesque. Not even close. I closed them because I was shocked. I had no fucking idea. And no fucking preparation for what I saw. I thought I knew you, Eve. Thought I knew what you looked like—as you and as her.” The redhead. “I had no fucking clue that window had damaged your face. No idea the explosion wounded more of you than the one scar you did reveal.”

Eve gasped as if she couldn’t breathe, and Zachary backed off, took a step away, leaving her standing against the fridge. He shoved a hand through his hair. “When you first told me about…about the bomb, I’d never felt so powerless, never been less able to protect the woman I loved. I wanted to hurt someone. Wanted to injure the people who’d done this to you. But then last night… Last night when I realized just how…how extensive your injuries were, I was gutted. For you, Tiny. I couldn’t comprehend how you’d endured such…violence, such hatred. Such pain. How you’d borne those scars and lived with them.”

His chest heaved, filled with pain and impotence and desperation. “The part that knocked me flat was how fucking much you must have hurt. How fucking long it must have taken you to recover, and how fucking unfair life could be. And I was mad too. Mad that anyone could do that to you. It hurt…me.” And if it had hurt him, he could only imagine what it had done to her. “Felt like someone was poking my stomach with a burning stake. The impotence, the anger, the injustice. All of it. Except you, Eve. You don’t… You could never repulse me.”

The fight fizzled out of her. How could Eve possibly remain angry with him after that?

She wanted to walk over to him. Wanted to lean into him, have him wrap his arms around her and assure her everything would be okay.

But she couldn’t, and it wouldn’t.

Zachary might not have been repulsed by her, but he had pitied her. And every time he saw her face, he’d pity her all over again.

Eve didn’t want his sympathy. She didn’t want anyone’s sympathy. She just wanted to lead a regular life with a regular guy, and that, she’d learned once again, would never happen. Not for her.

Her sigh was long and jagged, kind of like the glass that had cut through the muscles in her chest. “I believe you,” she said simply.

The breath whooshed from his chest. “Oh, Jesus. Thank you.”

“But I’d still like you to leave now.”

He went white all over again. “What? Why?”

“Because I don’t want your pity.”

“Pity?”

“I couldn’t bear to see that look in your eyes every time I removed my makeup.”

He gritted his teeth. “That look in my eyes was not pity. It was shock. There’s a difference.”

“If you say so.”

“Fuck, Eve. I don’t pity you. I admire you. Admire your strength and your backbone. Admire your ability to pick up the pieces of your life and move on. Admire that you took the worst thing that could happen to a person and made the most of it. You turned the instinct to hide your scars into a profession. A successful profession. You made a name for yourself. Pity is the last thing on my mind.”

“I don’t want to be admired either. I just want a normal, day-to-day relationship with a man.”

“And you think I don’t want that? You think I haven’t been waiting for it all my life? Waiting for you all my life? You think it’s easy to fall in love when you’re a fucking rock star? Think there’s anything normal about that? Yeah…uh. No! Being with you was the most normal I’ve been in the last three years.” He held up his hand. “No, scratch that. There is nothing normal about the way I feel about you. Nothing normal about the intensity of my emotions. I fucking love you. I’m crazy mad about you. I…I feel things I’ve never felt before” He pounded his chest. “Feel them deep inside, like your emotions are mine. I hurt when you hurt, laugh when you laugh. It’s like we’re connected somehow. Like we… Like you’re my fate. You are, Eve. You’re my fate. You’re mine. You’re a part of me.”

She wanted to let him back in. God knew she wanted to be his fate. He even made it sound like they had a chance. Made it sound romantic—and possible. But a part of her, one she couldn’t ignore, still believed he’d never really be able to see past her scars. No matter what he’d said, it wasn’t feasible that anyone could get past that scarring. Hadn’t experience taught her that, time and again?

“Go, Zachary. Please. We’re over. There’s nothing left between us. Just…leave.”

Zachary growled fiercely and looked at her in pure frustration. Then he growled again, and before she could move, he grabbed both her hands in his and held tight.

What the…? That was deliberate. No question about it. Zachary knew exactly what he was doing.

Her palms tingled. Electricity raced up both of her arms. Spots danced in front of her eyes before the world around her turned grey and then black.

Pain shot through her eye and breathing became difficult, as though her nose were blocked. And damn it, her shin ached, from were Hannah had kicked her earlier. She was going to have a massive bruise there tomorrow.

What the…?

Hannah hadn’t kicked her in the shin.

Yeah, she had. After Bree punched her in the stomach.

Uh…

Oh, God. Not her. Him. Bree had hit Zachary. Several times.

Eve blinked, looked around, but everything was out of focus. Where before she’d been looking at Zachary and the kitchen door, now she stared at herself, in front of the fridge.

Eve groaned. She blinked again, but hard as she tried, her vision was still blurry. Maybe that was because she’d forced her stinging eye open? Soon as she closed it, her sight cleared, although now she could only see one side of the room.

No, it wasn’t her eye she looked out of. It was his.

Jesus, who cared about her—his—vision, or the pain in her—his—nose and leg. All he cared about was making this woman see how goddamned much he loved her. How important she was. How much he needed her in his life. Now and always.

What could he say? How could he make her understand?

Frustration and desperation boiled in his stomach.

Love her so damn much. Can’t walk away. Won’t.

She stared back at him, her eyes cloudy, her scars vivid on her unpainted cheek.

He didn’t care about the scars. Didn’t care they were there. Only that someone had hurt her this bad. It made him want to attack someone. Made him want to tear apart whoever had done this to her, limb by fucking limb.

“I love you, Eve.”

So damn much his ribs ached from it.

“Love you so much. I don’t see your scars. I don’t pity you. I only want to love you. Please, God, just give me the chance. Give me the opportunity to show you how happy we can be together.”

Eve didn’t respond. She seemed incapable of doing so. Her gaze was blank.

His heart pounded, his chest so full of love for her, he feared he might burst. “Jesus, Tiny. I know I’m holding your hands, know I shouldn’t be, but I can’t let go. Won’t let you go. Please, please, just feel it. Feel my love. Please.”

And that was the last thing he said before the blackness hit and Eve lost consciousness.

Eve came to on Bree’s couch. The ten or so scatter cushions pillowing her head gave her location away. She didn’t even try to open her eyes, knowing the room would spin out of control if she did.

She just lay there concentrating on breathing.

Inhale, exhale.

Inhale, exhale.

Her forehead pounded with the start of what promised to be a whopper of a headache.

“This is beginning to become a habit of yours, isn’t it?” she asked Zachary, knowing he was close by. She smelled his aftershave and heard his breathing.

How ridiculous was it that after only a few days she could identify him by the sound of his breathing?

“What is?” The voice came from close by. Very close. On the floor beside her?

“Holding my hand.”

“Desperation will drive a man do to do crazy things.”

“Holding my hand shouldn’t be so crazy.”

“Neither should loving someone, but you have me all twisted up in knots. I love you, but you’re making me crazy.”

Slowly, very slowly, she turned her head in the direction of his voice and opened her eyes. He was sitting on the floor with his knees bent and his arms on his knees. He stared at her through his one good eye, a brooding look on his face.

“You really do love me.” She knew it now. Knew it for absolute certain. Had felt his love welling in his chest.

“I do.” Zachary nodded. Such a simple action and yet such a firm affirmation. “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”

“I’m a scarred makeup artist with a bizarre gift. Why would you love me? Of all people?”

“Because you’re my fate. My other half. And no matter how scarred you are or how…insane a talent you have, we were born to be together. You make me whole. Well, when you’re not tearing my heart out, anyway. You make me feel things I’ve never felt for another living soul. How could I not love you?”

“I love you too, you know.”

Zachary’s eye closed and his shoulders seemed to sag with relief. “Thank fucking God.”

“I think I fell in love with you when you gave me those roses.”

Without opening his good eye, he grinned. “So they worked? Even if they were secondhand and half dead?”

Eve laughed tentatively. “Not those ones,” she corrected. “The fresh ones, that were meant for me.”

Zachary shifted forward on his butt, took her arm in his hand and tugged, hard.

Eve tumbled off the couch and straight into his lap.

When the room stopped spinning, she took a deep breath. “Way to ease the dizziness, Pace.”

“Couldn’t help it. I needed you in my arms, and you weren’t headed there by yourself anytime soon.” He cradled her, holding her close to his chest. He dropped his head so his forehead touched hers. “Say it again.”

“What?”

“That you love me.” His voice was a deep rumble in his chest.

“I love you, Zachary. I’m ridiculously in love with you.”

“Tell me you know I don’t find you…grotesque.”

She swallowed.

“Say it, Eve.”

“It’s tough. I…I know you love me. It’s just impossible to believe anyone could see past these scars.”

“I don’t care about them. Not that they mark your face, anyway. I only care that you were hurt by them.”

Her heart swelled. “I-I do believe you.” There was no way he’d be here now, holding her this tight, claiming to love her if the scars repulsed him. He’d never have come to find her in the first place.

He pulled his head away to look down at her. “I love you, Eve. Never want to let you go again.”

“Okay then.” That was perfectly fine with her. “Never let me go again.”

He closed his eye, a relieved smile tugging at his lips.

She traced her finger gently over his swollen eye, took in the smudge of blood by his nose. “Your face is a mess.”

Zachary snorted. “That’s rich, coming from you.”

Eve laughed out loud. “A classic case of the pot calling the kettle black?”

Zachary grinned. “Hello pot.”

“Hello kettle.”

They shared a long smile, then Eve stilled. “D-did we just joke about my scars?” She’d never done that. Never found reason to laugh about them before.

“We did.” Zachary kissed her forehead. “Your scars aren’t funny. But being with you makes me want to laugh. And what better way to start than by poking fun at the things that hurt us the most?”

“And what hurts you the most right now?”

“Truthfully?”

“Always.”

“My shin.”

“Oh, God,” Eve gasped. “Hannah kicked you.”

“How did you know?”

Eve waved her hand in the air. “I’m magic. Remember?”

“As if I could ever forget. And yes, your niece kicked me. In the shin, with her brand-new tap shoes on.”

Eve snorted in disbelief. “Why?”

“I’m guessing because she saw her mother laying into me and tried to emulate her.”

“Er, I probably should have warned you that Bree’s been a little protective since Bali.”

“I’m a quick learner. Just remind me never to hurt you again.”

Eve looked at him, suddenly dead serious. “Don’t hurt me again, Zachary.”

“Never again, Eve. You’re my life. My fate. My future.”

“I love you,” she whispered.

“I love you too,” he whispered back. “My grandmother was right, you know.”

“How so?”

“She told me I’d feel our love in the rhythm of my heart.” He guided her arm so that her hand found his chest. “When I’m with you, Tiny, my heart seems to beat only for you.”

And as Eve pressed her hand against Zachary’s chest to feel the rhythm of his love, Zachary sealed his lips to hers and neither of them said another word for a very, very long time.

About the Author

Apart from her family and friends, Jess Dee loves two things: romance and food. Is it any wonder she specializes in dee-liciously sexy romance? Jess loves hearing from readers. You can email her at jess@jessdee.com or find her at www.jessdee.com.

Look for these titles by Jess Dee

Now Available:

The Tanner Siblings

Photo Opportunity

Ask Adam

Circle of Friends

Only Tyler

Steve’s Story

A Question of…

A Question of Trust

A Question of Love

Fire

Winter Fire

Hidden Fire

Three of a Kind

Going All In

Raising the Stakes

Full House

Bandicoot Cove

Exotic Indulgence

Island Idyll

Afternoon Rhapsody

Office Affair

Speed

See You in My Dreams

Colors of Love

Two To Tango

A Touch of Confidence

More Than

More Than Friends

More Than Lovers

Print Collections and Anthologies

Risking It All

Three’s Company

Red Hot Winter

Red Hot Weekend

Three of a Kind

Bandicoot Cove: Tropical Desires

Bandicoot Cove: Tropical Haze

Two To Tango

Coming Soon:

More Than

More Than Words

Print Collection

Speed: Rhythm of the Night

Every girl’s fantasy…one woman’s dream.

See You in My Dreams

© 2011 Jess Dee

Speed, Book 1

Sophie Butler is sure she’s about to lose her much-needed cleaning job. She’s not only walked in on a guest—a violation of her employer’s cardinal rule—but she can’t seem to tear her gaze away from his gorgeous, naked-as-the-day-he-was-born body.

If all that isn’t bad enough, her usually sensible judgment and behavior are clouded by a nagging sense of familiarity. She knows the man from somewhere, she just can’t quite place him.

Nathan Pace is certain he’s just lost his jealously guarded anonymity. But hold on…if she’s just another fan looking for a piece of his alter ego, rock star Jamie Speed, why is she blushing six shades of scarlet? And why is he instantly aroused? When he catches a glimpse of her eyes, he knows. She’s the woman who for ten years has haunted his dreams.

The attraction that flares between them is undeniable—and unstoppable. But getting close means risking Nathan’s secret identity. Just this once, he’d like a woman to fall for the real man, not the press’s version of a celebrity superstar.

Warning: This may be an erotic contemporary romance, but it does contain a hint of fantasy. And when that fantasy involves erotic dreams about a gorgeous rock star, you know you’re gonna want the fantasy to become reality…

Enjoy the following excerpt for See You in My Dreams:

Nathan’s legs buckled beneath him. He collapsed into the heated water with a mighty splash.

It took several minutes for his erratic heartbeat to normalize. He’d gone from zero to a hundred and back in a matter of minutes, and he had not a drop of energy to spare. Sophie had utterly depleted his reserves.

Heart still pounding, he looked at her through the steam rising between them. She sat opposite him with a smug, satisfied grin. The ends of her wavy blonde hair trailed in the water, and her cheeks had turned pink from the raised water temperature. His initial assessment of her had been spot-on. She was absolutely beautiful.

“That was…” His voice came out all croaky, and he cleared his throat and tried again. “That was unbelievable.” Hands-down the best blowjob he’d ever received.

She smacked her lips together as though tasting something in her mouth. Him. “You liked it?” The mischievous grin was back.

“You have no idea.” The words sounded like sandpaper scraping against a wooden surface.

Sophie shivered.

“Are you cold?” he rasped. Her high, pert breasts floated in the water, the nipples puckered into hard beads.

Slowly she shook her head. “Not cold, no.” She closed her eyes and rested her head against the edge of the tub. “It’s your voice. God, Nathan. Just listening to you talk turns me on.”

Her answer caught him in the chest and his heart stumbled over a beat. “It does?”

“Whatever you say, I feel it on my skin. At the coffee shop, your words were like hot honey running down my neck.” Her breathing slowed. “Lying on the couch now? I asked questions just so I could hear you answer. If we hadn’t just had sex, I’d have been totally aroused. And now, after you’ve come…your voice sounds…feels like a million silky fingers roaming over my breasts and my stomach…and lower.” One of her hands hovered in the water, and she dragged her nails across her nipples and moaned. “Your voice feels like the first flutters of an orgasm.”

Nathan watched, speechless. For the life of him, he could not think of one single response. It wasn’t as if he’d never heard a compliment about his voice before. Hell, his entire career revolved around his vocals. It was the way Sophie said it. As if his voice alone could bring her sexual fulfillment.

She caressed her breasts without opening her eyes. “Talk to me, Nathan. Say something. Anything.”

Still he stared, dumbstruck. Watching her stroke herself was possibly the sexiest thing he’d ever had the pleasure of witnessing.

Her arm stilled. “Nathan?”

“No,” he objected. “Don’t stop. Let me watch you touch yourself.”

Sophie let out a small moan and pinched a nipple between two fingers.

Nathan swallowed. “Do you have any idea how much of a turn-on that is?”

“What?” Sophie whispered.

“You,” Nathan whispered back. “Pleasuring yourself to the sound of my voice.”

“Do you have any idea what a turn-on your voice is?” Sophie asked.

“Show me.” Nathan bit the inside of his cheek. He wanted to touch her almost as much as he wanted to watch her. “Move your hand lower.”

Sophie froze.

“Don’t stop, sweetheart. Listen to me. Move your hand lower.”

Ever so slowly, Sophie complied. She dropped her hand from her breast to her stomach.

“Lower still.” Nathan stared through the water at the distorted image of her hand. “Run your fingers over your clit.”

Sophie shivered. Her shoulders tensed. Water rippled around her chest. He couldn’t see clearly through the steam, but the sharp hiss of air through her teeth told him she’d found what she sought.

“Now stroke it,” he told her. “Using just your finger, stroke it in tiny circles. Lightly. Don’t apply any pressure.”

Sophie’s lips parted slowly. “Mmmm.”

“Keep going. Keep rubbing it, sweetheart.”

“Keep speaking, Nathan,” she begged.

Anything. He’d do anything to ensure she didn’t stop. “You look so damn beautiful sitting there. I’ve already come twice, and I swear I’m getting hard again. It’s you, Sophie Rose. You bring out the beast in me.”

She whimpered.

“Press on your clit a little harder,” he said. “Move your finger a little faster.”

Again tiny ripples of water flowed around her.

“Imagine it’s my voice touching you.”

“It is,” she murmured. “Your voice is echoing right…through me. Right through…my pussy.”

Nathan bit back a groan. His balls tightened painfully. Fuck, he couldn’t handle another erection. Not this soon. “It’s not just my voice on your pussy,” he told her. “It’s my mouth too. I’m running my tongue over your clit. Licking your swollen flesh. I…I can’t wait to lick lower, to taste your juices as they spill out between your legs.”

The ripples turned to small waves as her arm moved frantically below the surface. “Nathan…oh, God…”

Fuck. So much for avoiding another erection. “Is it happening? Are you feeling the first flutters of orgasm?”

She let out a strangled gasp.

He was at half-mast and growing every minute. “Look at me, Sophie Rose. I want to see your eyes when you come.”

Sophie opened her eyes and stared at him wildly.

Yes. Exactly how he’d imagined them. Exactly how he’d seen them…in his dreams. “Let go now. Let the pleasure roll through you. Let it overcome you.” He waited a heartbeat and then whispered, “Come for me, Sophie Rose. Come to the sound of my voice.”

When you land in hot water, swim for safety—or let the fire burn.

Hotter Than Ever

© 2013 Elle Kennedy

An Out of Uniform Story

Claire McKinley has just experienced every bride’s nightmare. The groom is a no-show, and now she must face five hundred guests alone. Furious and humiliated, Claire seeks help from the most unlikely candidate—her almost-brother-in-law, who promptly whisks her away to his apartment in San Diego, where she can recover her pride in peace and quiet.

Dylan Wade is no fan of Claire’s, but no way can he leave the jilted bride in her time of need. Bringing her home seems like a good idea—until he remembers his new roommate. Dylan’s relationship with Aidan is…complicated. And with Claire thrown into the mix, life becomes even more…complicated.

Claire is blindsided by her attraction not only to Dylan, but also to Aidan, a man she’s just met. Soon they’re caught up in an all-consuming sexual storm they can’t fight even if they wanted to. Yet Claire wonders if it can last, or if she’s just setting herself up for more heartache.

Warning: This book is very dirty. Ménage a trois and man-on-man dirty. Graphic-language and explicit-sex dirty. Basically? Dirty. You’ve been warned.

Enjoy the following excerpt for Hotter Than Ever:

The worst thing about being a redhead with fair skin? It was impossible to disguise a blush. Claire’s cheeks had been a thorn in her side her whole life, and as her face heated up under Dylan’s smoldering gaze, she knew she was transmitting everything she was feeling loud and clear.

Surprise.

Embarrassment.

Arousal.

Oh yeah, there was definitely arousal thrown into the mix. Ever since they’d kissed, she’d been trying to squash the desire she felt for Dylan, but now that her misconceptions about the man had been exposed, she was having a tough time controlling her hormones. It was one thing to ignore the attraction when she’d thought he was a selfish ass who didn’t give a shit about his mother’s troubles, another one altogether when she knew he was actually a decent guy.

“Ah, relax, honey. I’m just teasing you.” His gorgeous green eyes twinkled. “I was kidding.”

She slanted her head in challenge. “Are you? Because you look pretty darn serious.”

After a second, he broke out in a grin. “Fine, so I was only half-kidding.”

“So half of you wants us to have sex?”

“Actually, about three-quarters of me wants it. One-quarter knows it’s probably a bad idea.”

“Probably?” She choked out a laugh. “I almost married your brother, Dylan.”

“And yet somehow that doesn’t seem to bother me anymore.”

“Right. Somehow.” She snorted. “It’s easy to overlook the reasons you shouldn’t do something when you want it badly enough.”

“And you don’t?”

“I don’t what?”

“Want it.” His lips quirked. “Because you’ve been giving off come-hither signals since the second you saw that box of condoms.”

“Again with the come-hither signals? You really like saying the words come-hither, huh?”

“And you’re deflecting. Answer the question. Do you want to have sex with me?”

His frankness was oddly thrilling. So was the way he slid closer, eliminating the distance between them. He moved the box of provisions out of the way, then scooted even closer, and Claire’s heart began to race. Their thighs were touching, his covered by sweatpants, hers bare thanks to her short-shorts, and the heat of his body sizzled her flesh, eliciting a rush of excitement that rippled through her blood.

“Yes, no, maybe?” he prompted.

It was in that moment that Claire realized how honesty might be considered a weakness rather than a strength, because the word “Yes” slipped out of her mouth before she could stop it.

But damn it, she did want this. Dylan had set her entire body on fire from that one measly kiss—she could only imagine what he was capable of doing to her if they were naked.

Maybe it made her a mega slut and a terrible person, but she really, really wanted to find out.

As his mouth curved in a satisfied smile, Dylan brought his hand to her face and stroked her cheek with his thumb.

“You’re always blushing.” He cocked his head pensively. “Is that blush limited to your cheeks, though? Or do other parts of you get nice and rosy too? Maybe here, you think?”

He glided his fingers along the curve of her neck and down to her collarbone.

As if on cue, heat suffused her chest.

“Oh, that’s nice.” His green eyes were focused intently on the flush rising just above the neckline of her tank top.

The pads of his fingers were rough, callused, creating a gentle scrape over her skin as he caressed the upper swell of her breasts.

“This is crazy,” she murmured.

“Probably.”

“Definitely.”

He withdrew his hand. “I’ll stop then.”

Disappointment spiraled through her, and God help her, but her lips formed a squeaky protest. Yes, this was crazy. Yes, sleeping with Chris’s brother would be highly inappropriate. But she wanted it to happen. She needed it to happen.

“Claire?” His expression was expectant.

“You know the night I caught you kissing Aidan?” she heard herself blurting out.

“How can I forget?” he said dryly.

“That night…what I saw…” She tried to articulate her jumbled thoughts. “The two of you were completely wrapped up in each other, oblivious to the world around you. It was passionate and intense and it made me kind of sad because I’d never experienced anything that even came close to that.” She swallowed. “And I was so turned on afterwards.”

He looked incredibly intrigued. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

His voice lowered to a husky pitch. “Did you make yourself come when you went back to your room?”

“Yes.”

A groan rumbled out of his chest. “Aw, fuck, Claire, that’s hot. You were fingering yourself while I was in the living room twenty feet away?”

“Yes.”

She should have been mortified confessing all this to him, yet it was impossible to feel embarrassed when Dylan was looking at her with such unadulterated lust. When her gaze lowered to his groin, she made out the unmistakable ridge of his erection, and a resulting rush of moisture soaked her panties.

“Did you come hard?” he rasped. “Was it good?”

She met his sultry gaze. “It was the best orgasm I’ve ever had.”

“Hmmm. Challenge accepted.”

“Of course you’d see that as a challenge,” she said with shaky laugh. “But yeah…watching the two of you like that…it showed me what I was lacking in my own life.”

“Where are you going with this?”

She inhaled a deep breath. “I guess what I’m saying is that I want to experience…well, passion.” A wry note entered her voice. “And since we’re trapped in here for the next couple of hours, I guess having sex wouldn’t be a totally preposterous idea.”

“Are you trying to convince me, or yourself? Because I was on board from the second you pulled out those condoms.”

The grin he flashed her was contagious. “That’s because you’re a man. Women need some time to rationalize before they jump into things.”

“So are you done rationalizing?”

She pondered that. “I think so.”

“Good. Now come here and kiss me.”

“Come wher—” She yelped in delight as he hauled her onto his lap.

She grabbed his shoulders and clutched the sleeves of his T-shirt, moaning when he tugged on her ponytail to yank her head down. The second their lips met, heat unraveled inside her and danced along her flesh. He kissed her like a man possessed, his tongue sliding inside her mouth with a greedy thrust, robbing her of breath.

Passion. There it was. Surrounding her. Consuming her. She’d never been kissed like this before. Except…wait, that wasn’t true, because she’d experienced this very same thrill the other night when she’d kissed him. This time, however, there was no doubt in her mind that he was attracted to women—the hard cock pressing against her ass was all the evidence she needed.

Dylan continued to drive her wild with his mouth, his tongue, his teeth as he nibbled on her bottom lip before sucking on it. His hands traveled down the bumps of her spine, callused fingers snaking beneath the hem of her shirt.

She shivered as he began sliding the material up, those strong hands caressing her stomach, moving closer and closer to the undersides of her breasts.

When his exploration came to an abrupt halt, she voiced her disapproval in the form of a groan.

“Don’t worry,” he said with a chuckle. “I have every intention of playing with these gorgeous tits, but first I want to enjoy the view. Up you go.”

In the blink of an eye, he was helping her to her feet.

“What are you doing?”

A smile lifted the corners of his mouth. “Me? Well, I’m going to lie here like this—” he fell back on his elbows, looking mighty pleased with himself, “—and watch while you undress.”

Her eyebrows flew up. “You want me to do a striptease? Am I supposed to dance or something?”

“Naah, no dancing required. And you don’t even have to go slow. Rip those clothes off if you want.”

“Do it for me.” Her brazen order came out of nowhere, surprising them both.

“Nope. Like I said, I’m just gonna enjoy the view.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously.” He licked his lips. “Come on, honey, show me some skin.”

Although the two of them had worked everything out, a part of her still felt slightly wary, wondering if he was playing a cruel joke on her. Like she would take off her clothes, let him see her naked, and then he’d jump up and say, “Gotcha! I still hate you!”

Dylan must have read her mind, because he let out a breath and stood. “How about this? I’ll go first.”

Rhythm of My Heart

Jess Dee

He rocks every woman’s world, but his heart beats only for her.

Speed, Book 3

Makeup artist Eve Andrews is an expert at blending into the background. Landing a job with the rock band Speed is the opportunity of a lifetime, and thankfully as close to the spotlight as she’ll ever get again—until the band’s sinfully sexy drummer turns his dazzling eyes on her.

After a scandal shook his world, Zachary Pace, a.k.a. “Jonah Speed”, has given up the one-night stands and easy lays. One look at Eve, and he senses his self-imposed abstinence is about to come to a screeching halt—but he’s confused. His grandmother foretold his destiny lies with a beautiful redhead, not a tiny, brown-haired pixie.

Under the heat of Zachary’s intense focus, Eve’s resistance melts away, but not the façade that hides her terrible secret. And when she accidentally catches a glimpse of his heart’s desire—his fated redhead—her instincts tell her to let him go…before he gets too close. Before he sees the real woman behind her mask, and her heart is left in the dust of his almost-certain retreat.

Warning: This is a Speed book, so you know there’s gonna be a small element of fantasy to it. And a big element of romance. Oh, yeah, and whole lot of sex. Sex hot enough to make you throb to the rhythm of a very sensual beat…

eBooks are not transferable.

They cannot be sold, shared or given away as it is an infringement on the copyright of this work.

This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

Samhain Publishing, Ltd.

11821 Mason Montgomery Road Suite 4B

Cincinnati OH 45249

Rhythm of My Heart

Copyright © 2013 by Jess Dee

ISBN: 978-1-61921-804-8

Edited by Jennifer Miller

Cover by Kendra Egert

All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

First Samhain Publishing, Ltd. electronic publication: October 2013

www.samhainpublishing.com

Content

Rhythm Of My Heart
Speed 3
by
Jess Dee

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

About the Author

Speed, Book 1