He blushed.
“Hey, Dani, you’re home early,” Trey said. “You get fired again?”
“Hah. No.” Dani stuck her tongue out at him. “But I might have cussed at some obnoxious tourists and been sent home early in shame.”
“Shame?”
“You’re right, no shame. They were assholes. And who is this tall drink of exotic water?”
“Dom,” Dom said before Trey could lay out his full name.
She grinned. “Is that your name or your favorite position?”
“Dani,” Trey said, a very sexy warning tone in his voice.
“Oooh, is this your hookup from last night?” Dani seemed suitably impressed. “Very nice choice to pop that cherry.”
Trey’s face went scarlet. “Dani.”
Dom didn’t get it at first—not until Dani’s wide-eyed surprise turned into embarrassment. His stomach soured. Fuck, no wonder Trey had gone soft.
“I’ll go away now,” Dani said, a squeak in her voice. “Nice to meet you, Dom.”
“Likewise.” Dom swallowed hard after she disappeared into the kitchen. He studied Trey’s hunched shoulders and red face, uncertain how to address this. Trey had his reasons for not making a big deal about it, but for Dom it was a big fucking deal. “You should have told me.”
Maybe he’d put too much growl into that, because Trey looked up, all defiant and annoyed. “Why? We still had a good time. And I didn’t want to be treated like a kid or something. I wanted to get fucked, and you did a stellar job.”
Dom didn’t want compliments. He wanted to redo the whole thing. Go slower. Give Trey a memorable first time, not a fast fuck in the backseat of a car. “I could have hurt you.”
“But you didn’t, and we can’t change it.” Trey grimaced. “Look, today has been super fun, and I don’t want to say good-bye with you mad at me over something that I don’t think is a big deal.”
Dom didn’t have the mental power or the time to explain to Trey why he thought itwasa big deal. That was a can of worms too big for a brand-new friendship. So he changed the subject. “I didn’t think this was good-bye.”
“Well, good-bye for now.” He squeezed Dom’s free hand. “You’re really talented with that violin, Dom. Don’t hide it away from people. They need to hear you.”
“Thanks, man.” Dom held tight, desperate for that final touch from Trey. “Good luck finding a drummer.”
“If you know any good ones, send them my way.”
The joke dug under Dom’s skin like a sliver of glass, painful and impossible to ignore. “Sure thing. ’Til next time?”
“Until next time.”
Walking away from Trey felt a bit like going under water. His chest ached in a strange way, and he found it harder to breathe. As he walked to the nearest bus stop, Dom wasn’t sure he’d ever feel normal again—especially if XYZ was responsible for Trey’s dream crashing down around him.
Lincoln, Benji, and Tyson were already waiting for him in the hotel lobby by the time he got back, lounging all over a wide, circular sofa, and Dom was again struck by how lucky he was to get to play with such collective hotness. Lincoln had the tall, all-American blond-haired, blue-eyed thing working in his favor, along with a killer body that frequently got him ogled by men and women. By contrast, Benji had wavy brown hair that was always one stiff breeze from being a mess, but the look worked for him, and the added bonus of the thickest eyelashes Dom had ever seen on a dude. And smack in the middle of the inside-out Oreo was Tyson, with his mahogany skin and fuck-you attitude that, on him, was hella sexy.
Dom was kind of surprised they weren’t surrounded by admirers, because if he hadn’t already known who they were, he’d have wanted to stop and find out.
Benji waved him over. Dom pointed at his violin case, then rushed it upstairs. Lincoln and Benji weren’t at all annoyed by his extra task, but Tyson eyeballed him like he was crazy.
“You take that thing with you everywhere?” Tyson asked.
“Dom would marry that chunk of wood if he could,” Lincoln teased. He got away with teasing Dom about the violin, becausehe’d been Dom’s best friend since they were fifteen. And Lincoln knew why Dom had put it down for years.
“She’s my baby,” Dom replied.
“Yeah, I know.” Lincoln knuckled his shoulder. “Why were you running around town with her today? You have a gig you didn’t tell me about?”
