I looked up at the dark ceiling and inhaled deeply. If that was Winnie banging on my hotel room door in the middle of the night, I’d tell her the same thing I told her just hours ago. And secretly, as much as I hated leaving her unsatisfied, I relished it too. But if we could just talk. If we could just straighten things out, there’d be a lifetime full of naughty little games for us to play.
Another knock sounded from the hallway.
I fumbled for the light and slipped on the jeans I’d left on the floor before pulling the door open. “Hey,” I said in the deepest growl I could manage. I told her we’d talk first, but I never said I’d play fair—especially not after that lip-biting action she served tonight.
“Are you feeling ill?” the person in the hallway who definitely was not Winnie Baker asked. “Because I haven’t left my house in six months for more than an hour at a time, and I didn’t come all this way just to catch whatever it is you have.”
“Isaac?” I asked. “Is—is this real? Am I hallucinating?”
Isaac Kelly, my reclusive friend and the third member of INK, stood there wearing slouchy jeans tucked into blackboots and white V-neck tee that teased at a silver necklace worn underneath. His hair was different than when I’d last seen him, no longer the signature heartthrob tousle he’d had at Brooklyn’s funeral but now thick, loose waves around his jaw. It was as careless and broody as the rest of his outfit, and of course, like everything else on Isaac Kelly, it looked unfairly good.
I peered down the hallway to see a tall bodyguard with her hair pulled back in a low ponytail and sunglasses pushed up over her head even though it was the middle of the night. Beside her was Donna, the assistant he’d had since INK broke up and he went solo.
“What’s up, Donna?” I called down the hallway.
She didn’t look up from her phone as she sighed and said, “Kallum.”
“Cool,” I said to Isaac. “So she still hates me.”
He glanced down to Donna and shrugged. “Not just you. Nolan too.”
“Oh, that makes me feel so much better.” She’d wanted Isaac to stay clear from us both, especially after Nolan’s big scandal. “So what the hell are you doing here?”
He tilted his head to the side. “You asked if I wanted someone to be sad with.”
I blinked. Once. Twice.
“In the text you sent,” he added.
“Isaac, that was months ago.”
“Well, I’m here now.” He walked past me and into my room. “And I’m ready to be sad with you.”
I leaned out the door. “I promise not to besmirch his name, Donna. You can go to bed.”
Donna rolled her eyes and turned down the hallway with a key in her hand as the very intense-looking bodyguard strolled down the hallway toward my door.
“Uh, is your bodyguard going to be joining us?” I asked Isaac, who had already opened my mini fridge, retrieved a toasted pecan beer, and was propped up in my bed.
“Krysta will wait in the hallway. Or scope out the floor or some kind of tactical thing. I don’t know. Do your thing, Krysta!” he called to her.
I saluted her before closing the door. “That woman looks like she could knock me on my ass.”
“Because I could,” she said through the door.
“Good to know!” I told her as I came to sit down on the other side of the bed beside Isaac.
“So what is it that we’re sad about, Kallum? I didn’t even know you could be sad.”
“That’s it?” I asked. “We’re not going to talk about what the fuck you’re doing in Vermont? Or how you haven’t answered a phone call from me in over a year? Shit. Shouldn’t I at least drag Nolan down here?”
“He’s here?” Isaac asked.
“FilmingDuke the Halls 2.”
“Well, that explains why I couldn’t rent out the mansion.”
“You tried to rent outthe mansion?”
