I caught a glimpse of his eyes in the dark, shining, watching me, and then he pressed his forehead to mine, his cock throbbing deep inside me, his hips grinding against me as he came. I wrapped my arms around him, twisting my fingers in the whorls of his hair as he drove himself into me, holding him tight as he groaned.
“Fuck, Katie,” he breathed as he settled against me.
It was four in the morning.
I was tangled up in Jesse, in his warmth, his limbs, neither one of us saying another thing. Eventually his breaths came slower and slower against my neck as he tumbled into sleep, his heartbeat thumping against mine.
He was still half on top of me. He was still inside me.
His arm tightened around my waist in sleep and my heartbeat surged.
I sighed a ragged sigh, sinking deeper into the bed, willing my pulse to slow, my breaths to calm, my body to relax into sleep.
I stroked the silken hair at his temple, brushing back a wayward curl, watching him sleep from beneath my half-mast eyelids. I couldn’t look away, couldn’t quite close them just yet.
And, yeah. In that moment, I knew it.
There was no point denying it to myself anymore.
I was in love with Jesse Mayes.
CHAPTER 30
KATIE
“They’re not back yet?”
I stood in the doorway looking in at the empty hotel room. I hadn’t seen Jesse since he took off that morning with Jude.
“I’ll track them down,” Flynn said behind me.
I walked into the room and dropped my bags on the bed. I’d been at the beach, then doing a little shopping to kill the time… but I was really hoping I’d get to see more of Jesse today.
It was my birthday, after all.
We’d been in L.A. for four days and something weird was going on.
On the surface everything was fine. Things had been pretty epic, actually, from about the moment Jesse and I started sleeping together. Then somewhere around Vegas things took a sharp turn. I kept hearing him on the phone with someone, a female someone, semi-arguing. And his mood took a nose-dive. But he never mentioned it to me and I was way too scared to ask.
Because apparently, just when I thought things could hardly get any better between us—other than that pesky little problem of him not being in love with me—they got totally worse.
A lot worse.
The closer we got to L.A., the worse it got. Jesse got all broody and withdrawn. He took to spending more time alone with his guitar. He always had a smile for me and the sex was still phenomenal, but something was deeply wrong and I was about one more of those far-off, distracted looks in his eyes from becoming a total wreck.
In desperation, I’d even started hoping he might say something in his sleep to give me a hint at what was going on in his gorgeous head, but I hadn’t heard anything beyond a bit of mumbling. And I’d had a lot of sleepless nights to eavesdrop.
“He’s still in a meeting,” Flynn reported, after texting Jude. “He’ll meet you at the restaurant for dinner at eight. Still lots of time to make it to the show.”
Shit. He was running late. On my birthday.
He’d already played two sold-out concerts in L.A. and tonight we were going to see Zane’s side project band, Wet Blanket, play at a club. I’d been so looking forward to this night, because I was dying for more downtime with Jesse. He’d been busier than ever—at least, too busy for me—and even though we’d been “being seen” every night, as usual, at some club or restaurant or party, I didn’t feel like I’d really seenhimin over a week.
“Okay,” I told Flynn, resigned. “I guess just knock on my door when you’re ready to go.” I tried to sound normal and not like my life was crumbling around me.
“We should head out at seven-thirty.”
“Great.”
