Page 87 of My Three Billionaire Rockstars

I study him. “You could’ve stayed. Tried to change it.”

“I did.”

“And?”

His jaw tightens. “It wasn’t enough.”

I nod, looking back at the water.

It’s hard to picture him in a band, up on a stage, a thousand people screaming his name. “You regret it?”

He finishes off nearly half his beer in a single swallow. “Regret? No. I miss it. Sometimes. But regret? That’s just nostalgia’s little lie. Besides, I like what I do now.”

“Standing still in a sleepy little town?”

He smirks. “Does it look like I’m standing still to you?”

I pick at the label on my beer, peeling if off in a spiral. “So, what’s the plan, Xander?”

He’s silent for a long beat. “There isn’t one.”

“Really?”

He glances at me sideways, jaw tense. “You ever just let something happen?”

I consider it. “Occasionally. Usually ends in disaster.”

“I wouldn’t mind a little disaster.”

“Okay.” I smirk. “So, let’s play a game.”

“What kind of game?”

“Strip rock paper scissors.”

He barks out a laugh, cut short like he missed the first joke and now he’s trying to catch up. “You’re kidding.”

I give him nothing. “Dead serious.”

He sets his beer down, knuckles white against amber glass. “Alright. But if I lose, I’m not walking back to my car naked.”

I peer at him. “You think you’ll lose?”

He lifts one dark brow. “You don’t strike me as the sort who loses on purpose.”

“Neither do you.”

He starts to roll up his sleeves even higher, like he needs a better range of motion for this cataclysmic showdown.

He holds out his fist. “You ready?”

Round one, I lose. Paper on rock.

I drag off my boots, chuck them with exaggerated petulance halfway down the dock.

The second round I win, scissors on paper, and he peels his shirt over his head with a shrug, like he’s undressing for a painting. Tattoos: old, new, black, color, some faded to green. The stitched seam of a surgery scar like a zipper up his bicep. I want to ask about them all, but I want even more to run my tongue along every ridge.

The next round, we both go scissors, then both rock, then finally I go paper, him scissors, and I lose again.