Jake shrugged. “He’s my cousin so it doesn’t matter.”
A woman with hair that looked like Rapunzel’s wound through the crowd towards Jake, only giving Lainey the briefest of looks.
“Hiya, Chelle.”
Lainey saw him grin at whoever Chelle was. She felt her back stiffen.
“Jake!” Chelle glanced at Lainey and gave her a smile, although it was weak. “I wondered if you’re coming to the party afterwards. It’s at Louise’s.”
Lainey waited for the key line ofwe’d both love to have you there,but it didn’t come.
“Thanks, Chelle, but I have a ton of stuff to sort out here.” Jake’s fingers pressed a little more into Lainey’s waist. To be fair to Chelle, she probably couldn’t see that Jake had his arm around her, not with the crowds.
Chelle looked a little surprised he was saying no. “How about after? It’ll be a late one.”
“I’ll need to be up early in the morning. I’ll catch up with you again sometime.” His smile this time wasn’t as broad.
Lainey felt her heart rate start to settle, annoyed with herself for letting it get like that to start with. She pushed her lips together and gave in.
She liked Jake Maynard.
Not just liked as a neighbour who helped out, or could hold a conversation, but like as inliked.She’d accepted she found him attractive – the man was as hot as fuck to be quite honest – but she’d put that down to the blonde hair, blue eyes that were always laughing and the body that should’ve been stuffed and mounted.
She also had a feeling she was going to get to know that body even better in the next few hours.
Chelle nodded, said something that Lainey didn’t take in. She was too busy taking in that the need for Jake to scratch that itch was greater than the need to prove a point and stay away from him.
“Nice girl.”
Lainey looked up at him. “One of your harem?”
He shook his head.
“She wanted to be tonight.” Lainey decided to inform him, just in case he hadn’t realised.
“You think?”
The crowd was dying down now, waiting for Scott and his bandmates to end the night with a couple more tracks. Lainey heard a guitar start, and Scott’s voice begin to sing the notes of a song that definitely had a side of growl to it.
“You don’t?” She wasn’t sure if he heard her.
Jake had shifted to be standing behind her, his arms around her waist and pulling her back against his front. She looked round to see if anyone was watching them, especially Imogen, who would head over like a bullet from a gun to interfere.
No one was. The barn wasn’t overly lit, the main lighting being used to showcase the bands. Lainey let herself relax against him, and then felt him relax, holding her a little closer.
Neither of them said anything, just listened to the couple of tracks Scott and Olly played, the last one an acoustic number, where the lyrics were about a lost love.
“Give me five minutes and I’ll walk you home.” Jake voice was gruffer than she’d heard it before.
“Don’t you need to kick everyone out?” She turned round to look at him, seeing something in his eyes that she knew he would see in hers. Lust.
“Micky and Jem, my managers are doing it. This place will look like no one’s been here by about nine tomorrow. They want to use the barns for a sports memorabilia sale next weekend – I said they could do it for free if they did the tidying up and were bouncers.” His grin wasn’t as smug as she’d usually expect.
“So you can leave?”
“Give me five to check on them and I’ll walk you home.”
She nodded, not sure what he meant by walking her home. Maybe it really was just to walk her home; she knew he didn’t trust Dylan, although he’d been pretty good at getting the work done that she wanted, and there were a few people around who she’d rather stay away from, but she could make it home fine.
