Chasing Kane (8 page)

“Sorry,” I sighed, “I just miss you so much.”

CJ got out of bed and tapped me on the shoulder. “I’m going to the back to play cards with some of the guys—wanna come?”

I shook my head, anxious for him to leave my personal space. “Talking with G.”

He nodded and, without a word, disappeared to the back of the bus.

“Was that CJ?” Georgia asked.

“Yeah.”

“He behaving?”

“Let’s not talk about him. I can’t think straight right now, I miss you so bad.”

A low purr came from the back of her throat and in my head I could see the face she always made to accompany that delicious tone. “Real bad?” she asked.

My voice came out more breathless by the second as I slid a hand to my jeans. “Bad, G. You have no idea how badly I want you right now. Right here. Right now.” I was so hard, my body was more than relieved when I undid my button and zipper, releasing myself from constraint.

She whispered. “You’re all alone right now?”

I nodded, as if she could see. “Yeah.”

“Me too. In our bed. The sheets still smell like you.”

I swallowed, my throat dry as I wrapped my hand around my rock-hard cock. “Keep talking …”

Her voice was playfully seductive. Low, enticing, luring. She was a predator of the best kind, and I’d fall for her every time—in person or not. “I’m in the blue silky panties you like … with the black polka dots.”

“What bra are you wearing?” My pulse quickened at just the thought of her in those damn panties.

“I’m not,” she answered, sending me into another level of ecstasy. “I’m running my hands over my breasts, wishing they were your hands.” Her breath picked up the way it did when I put her nipple between my lips.

“Jesus …”

“Tell me what you’d do if you were here. I miss you, Regan …”

I groaned when she said my name, closing my eyes to bring her as close to me as possible, pretending for a little longer that she was actually here and not in a whole other state. “I’d run my lips from your nipples to your navel. Slow, making you squirm.” The noises from the other end of the phone told me to continue as I stroked myself harder, faster.

“Then,” I continued, barely able to form words the closer I got to climax, “I’d bring my mouth into you, swirling my tongue.”

I could tell from the faint hum in the background that she had her vibrator in bed with her, and that just turned me on more, causing my orgasm to flood over and through me in a garbled mess of words and soft moans. I tried to be as quiet as possible, but there’s only so much control one has …

A few seconds later, Georgia got hers and, for a few quiet seconds we sat on the phone, listening to each other breathe.

“I miss you,” I said again, for what would be one of a million times over the next several months.

Panting, she answered back. “I miss you. I’ll see you soon and give you the R-rated version of what we just did.”

I groaned playfully, stripping from my jeans and boxers under the blanket, needing to wash those as soon as possible, and reminding myself of proper road etiquette for situations like this—be prepared. This took me off guard, though. Rookie move.

“See you in Oregon,” I said. “Goodnight.”

“Night, babe. I love you.”

“I love you.”

When the line went silent, I took another deep breath, savoring the temporary relief my own hand would provide before the desire swept up again, like waves on high tide—back in as fast as they leave.

A knock on the door separating our section from the back of the bus startled me—this wasn’t really a knocking type of crew.

“Yeah?” I called.

“It’s CJ, can I come in?”

I scrunched my eyebrows. “Yeah …”

A second later he burst into the “room,” all grins and bravado. “Thank God. I was wondering how long it would take you to polish one off.”

“The fuck you talking about?” My cheeks heated, and I hoped the dusky light of sunset would hide my embarrassment. I’m not the showman CJ is.

He waved his hand, giving my shoulder a hard clap before falling onto his own bed. “Come on, Regan. All low talking and whispers with Georgia? I know when to take a hint.”

I grumbled, rolling over. “Then take one now and shut up.”

He laughed. “All right, all right. But, just know this—”

“Do I have to?”

“Yes. I’ve got mad respect for you, man. Guys drop their girls left and right around here—wife or not. You don’t. I mean, G’s my best friend, so I’d hate to have to kick your ass if you started sniffing around—”

“You really are vile, you know that?” I cut in, peeking at him from over my shoulder.

He raised his hand. “Let me finish. I’m just saying, I’m happy for you
and
Georgia that you’re relationship is as tight as it is.”

“Thanks, man. I love her.”

“I know. So, I’m willing to clear the deck whenever you need to shine your knob.”

I flipped him the bird before slipping quickly into a satisfying sleep.

“For the cannoli,” Brian asked, “do you make or purchase the shells?”

He looked up after my long silence, chuckling when he saw my face. I crinkled my nose like I smelled garbage.

“What?” he asked innocently, laughing.

I put my hand on my hip and arched an eyebrow. “I wouldn’t sell them if I couldn’t make them. You know me better than that.”

A small grin took over the corner of his mouth. “Just checking,” he murmured.

“Do you mean for people to call this place Live, as in ‘I live here’ or Live as in ‘Live band’?” The question had been nagging at the back of my mind since Regan brought me there before he left on tour.

Brian looked up from the binder filled with pictures of my work and my many catering offerings, light in his eyes. “That’s part of the art. I call it the first way, but it’s about being open to expression and where we are in life. I’m an artist, like you, like Regan, but I’m not confined to just food.” He lowered his head, continuing to pore over my portfolio.

“Hmm.” I poured him coffee, thinking it over. “I think maybe you’re playing off not thinking things through all the way.”

His face was almost pale when he looked up again, his mouth open.

I swung at his shoulder with a towel from my apron. “I’m just screwing with you. I’ve known you too long to think you’re careless.”

Thankfully he laughed, his sense of humor seemingly fully in tact despite keeping up with the grueling schedule of a restaurant owner—a new one at that.

I used to waitress at bars he managed throughout the region. Sometimes I followed him outright when he left for another establishment, and other times we happened to end back up together and were a fierce crime-fighting duo with the after-midnight crowd.

In truth, I was now as exhausted as Brian. And my nerves were on edge, especially with Regan gone and me being left to my own devices. I’d been working a breakneck pace for years to get the bakery off the ground while working on my relationship with Regan, never mind dealing with the anxieties around my mother’s health. It would be enough to send anyone insane. But the double-edged sword of it all was that work was the only thing that helped keep me grounded one hundred percent of the time. I was never into drugs or boozing as an escape—productivity was my high.

“Always a smart ass,” Brian cut in, yawning. “Can you leave this place well enough alone to go hook up with your husband in Oregon?”

I walked back into the kitchen, double checking the contents of the refrigerator with the list in my hand to assure things would run as smoothly as possible while I was out of town. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You’re more balls-to-the wall than I’ve ever been.” He left his booth and joined me in the kitchen, swiping my list and leaning against the counter. “It’s been a hell of a successful few years for you, and I don’t want you to get burned out.”

I huffed, irritated to be having this conversation. There were far more men in the culinary business than women—at least here in San Diego, and conversations always veered down this path. “Do guys talk to each other like this, or is it my tits that subjects me to the ‘take it easy’ talk?”

Brian pursed his lips.

I pursed mine back in his silence. “I don’t tell you to take it easy. Wanna know why? Because you’re a grown-ass man who can handle himself.”

He shook his head. “Look. You and Regan both have a wicked work ethic. I just want to make sure you leave time for an actual relationship.”

I held out my hands. “When did this turn into couple’s counseling? Regan and I support each other in everything we do.”

“Friends can do that, too, G. Just nurture the love between the two of you, kay? The connection that first drew you to each other. Friends can’t do that the way lovers can.” A pall of sadness washed over his face. Distant, but visible—like a lighthouse in the fog.

Suddenly, I realized this wasn’t all about me.

“What’s going on with Randy?” I asked Brian of his longtime partner.

“Don’t turn this around—”

“Don’t be vague with me,” I cut in. “We’ve been through too much.”

He sighed, finally setting my list on the counter behind him and rubbing his hands over his face a few times. “He’s staying with his mom for a while …” His voice clipped off at the end of his sentence and I flew in to hug him as hard as I could.

“No,” I whispered. “What happened?”

“Life.” He shrugged. “He supported me, I supported his teaching career, all the way through his doctorate …”

“I know. So what
happened
?”

I let go and he leaned back, looking war-torn all of a sudden where his bright and affable face had been only minutes before.

“At the end of the day,” he sighed, “we realized we’d basically been support staff for each other for too long, and the love … it was on life support and the plug was hanging loose.”

“No.” I shook my head, panicked heat rising through my chest. “Love doesn’t just go away. You guys have been together for, what? Fifteen years? That’s not lust—it’s
love.
And love lasts.” I knew it took a lot more than love to keep two people together, but the other stuff seemed even more intangible, and volatile—if it was possible to find something more volatile than love.

“Maybe,” he conceded. “But I wonder if maybe we’re different people than we were a decade-and-a-half ago. Too different, I mean. Two people who might say
hi
in a coffee shop, but that’s it. Talking about dreams is a lot different than the realization of those dreams. The day-to-day.”

My eyes scanned his face, rapidly moving back and forth as I tried to make sense of his words. So, I paced. Around the stainless steel island that had been the focal point of my existence over the past few years. Where all the “magic” happened, as the food critics stated in their write-ups. The write-ups that made me, thankfully, busier each time. Causing me to spend more time around this steel rectangle.

“That’s not me and Regan,” I blurted out, stopping long enough to grip the edge of the island. “He was a professional musician before I even met him. Teaching, playing live on the side … and my bakery was underway, too, for that matter.”

Brian was roughly five foot ten, but his grand personality typically made him seem taller. On this day, though, he looked every bit his height standing in my bakery as I stared at him, and not an inch more. His Italian-olive skin was washed out, his dark eyes hopeless as he crossed his arms around his soft middle.
Never trust a skinny chef
, he always said.

“Georgia … look,” he started tiredly.

Then, it dawned on me.

“Did Regan say something to you?” I questioned.

Brian’s a terrible liar, looking down and to the right every
single
time.

“Brian …” I prodded when his eyes shifted.

“We’re friends,” he started. “Me and Regan. We were just … shooting the breeze before the tour and he was clearly anxious about having another tour—a long one even if it is relaxed—coming off the heels of nearly three years of nonstop touring. He was worried about you.”

“Bullshit.” Regan may very well have been worried about me, but he always told me that—there was something more there.

Great.
This is just great
.

Here I was, planning to spend a whole weekend away with Regan—a
busy
weekend for the bakery at that, and he was running around panicking to his friend. A mutual friend who I knew first, thank you very much—because we started talking seriously about having a baby. Total. Bullshit.

“Look, I’m just going to go back to the table and finish my order, okay? We can talk about all this more later … or not. I didn’t mean to dump my personal shit on you—or to have you turn it into your shit … again.”

That pushed me over the edge on which I built my camp. “What?” I snapped.

“It’s always that way. Yeah, part of having friends is the back-and-forth of shared experience, but, fuck, G. You
always
find a way to make it about you and sometimes … once in a fucking while
I’m
the one who needs an ear.”

The thing about Brian was he was different than almost all of my other friends. He’d go toe-to-toe with me in a way almost no one else did, except Regan, maybe. That’s what I loved and hated about him. I didn’t mind being challenged—but I would have rather had the challenge come about my opinions and not my behavior. I am human after all.

“But,” I challenged, “didn’t you make this about you in order to throw a parable my way? Is Randy even at his mom’s?”

That was the wrong thing to say.

Brian’s eyes misted over and he did that thing guys do where he sniffed, swallowed, and coughed at the same time in order to prevent something that might pass for a tear.

“Yes,” he finally answered through gritted teeth, pacing back to the booth in the front window of the store.

“Then why didn’t you tell me until now?” I followed him, sitting across from him in the booth while he tried to avoid my gaze.

Brian shrugged, flipping fast enough through the pages of my portfolio that I knew he wasn’t actually looking at anything. “Because we’ve been
busy
, Georgia. Isn’t that what we do, me and you? B
usy
?”