Searching for Neverland (32 page)

“Not intentionally,” Molly responded.

“It’s fine,” I said, answering for Josh, who still looked like he wanted to pass out. “Apparently there was a summer thing between these two a few years ago, and Josh thinks I’m upset.”

Emily looked wistful, as she glanced at the dark-haired guy who was still pacing the room. “I love summer flings,” she said, as she looked back at us.

Molly snorted. “You’re not supposed to get engaged to your summer fling, Em,” she chastised her, and Emily looked down at the huge princess cut diamond on her left hand.

“When your summer fling is as perfect is Zack you are,” she said, shaking her head as she looked back at the guy on the phone. He looked up, caught her gaze, and gave her a sexy smile.

“When are you getting married?” I asked her.

“Yes, when?” my sister asked, sliding up next to me. “And what will my bridesmaid dress look like.”

Emily shrugged. “Who the hell knows. This tour has gotten insane. Ever since the first album came out, and it blew away the projections, the demand for Liar’s Edge had been incredible. We’re touring with The Claws until the end of the summer as planned, but then we’re splitting off and doing a tour across the country in conjunction with the new album that’s coming out in
October
.”

“Octo
ber?!” Taryn shrieked.

Emily nodded, and Molly chimed in. “After we released
Jump
as a single, and it hit number one on the billboard charts, album sales went through the roof. People are begging for the new album, and the guys are already playing songs from it, so we had to speed up the release. Em’s right, it’s total insanity, but the guys have hardly recorded any tracks, so we’re heading to L.A. in
early
September so they can rec
ord. Then we’ll finally be
home for
a month
before we’re back on the road.”

“Wow. I’m so jealous!” Taryn gushed.

“No, don’t be,” Emily told her. “Oh my God, the press drives me up the wall half the time. I can’t even imagine what it’ll be like when the guys hit it big. I figured I’d be able to ease into my
first PR job, but no. The guys have radio shows daily in all the towns we stop in, reporters from all the industry magazines and the local newspapers have called asking to do interviews, and
Hit!
wants to put them on the cover in October. They’re sending someone out to L.A. for a photo shoot while we’re out there, and the Rachel’s going to interview Zack and the guys. Combine that with Derrick’s media antics, and I’ve got my hands full.”

“Rachel got the job at
Hit!
?” Taryn asked excitedly, and Emily nodded and smiled. “She did! She was thrilled, and she and Chase moved in together in May.”

“Aww, that’s so cute. I love them together. I should give Rachel a call.”

“She would love to hear from you,” Emily confirmed. “She can tell you all about her fabulous life in New York.”

I had absolutely no clue who they were talking about, but I didn’t have a chance to ask because the dark-haired guy who I assumed was Zack came up a
nd
put his arm around Emily’s shoulders. She leaned against his chest and sighed out loud.

“Everything okay, princess?” he asked.

She nodded. “I’m fine. Just tired. How’s Lily?”

He smirked to himself. “She’s a freakin’ handful according to Jen, but she told me she loved me and she said to ‘tell Emmy wub you’.” He shook his head. “I miss her.”

“Aww,” Emily said, sinking deeper into his side. “I miss her so much.”

And it was suddenly like the rest of us weren’t in the room. Emily and Zack were so in tune with each other that it felt like we were invading their space.

“Lily is Zack’s daughter,” Molly explained to Josh and me. “She’s almost two and a half.”

I nodded.

“Oh, she’s so cute,” Emily gushed. “Tare, you want to see pictures? Jen sends a few every couple of days. She’s getting so big!”

Emily pulled Taryn to the side, so she could show her pictures of Zack’s daughter, and I wondered what it would be like to have a kid when you were barely out of college. Scary thought.

“Josh, Taylor, this is my cousin, Zack Easton, and the lead singer and guitarist of Liar’s Edge,” Molly said then, introducing us to Zack, who just looked like he stood on stage with a guitar in his hand, belting out lyrics on a regular basis. He totally had that rock star vibe about him. “Josh and I used to sleep together. Do you remember meeting him?”

I started coughing as Josh pleaded with Molly, the anger ebbing into his voice. “Stop bringing that up, please,” he said firmly.

“Sorry,” Molly said to him. “Last time. I swear.” Then she looked at me. “It didn’t mean anything, I swear. We were high most of the time anyway.”

I looked over at Josh and raised my eyebrows at him, as if to ask ‘What the hell else don’t I know about you?’

Josh just pulled me against his chest and held on like he was afraid I’d bolt if given the opportunity.

Zack looked at Josh for a few seconds before recognition dawned on him. “Oh yeah, that was like three years ago. Shit, that was a fucked up summer. We did a hell of a lot of X. How are you, man?” he asked, as he reached forward to shake Josh’s hand.

Josh extended a hand, but kept me firmly latched to his side.

“So, I hear you guys are pretty amazing. I love your song,
Jump,
” I interjected, not wanting to have a visual of Josh high on ecstasy, fucking Molly’s brains out.

Zack rubbed his chin in his hand and shook his head. “I’m still not sure we should have gone commercial. I feel like a fucking sellout.”

Then he reached behind his ear for what looked like clove cigarette and stuck it in his mouth. Emily was by his side in an instant.

“I know,” he said, giving her a look that told her she didn’t need to say anything. She just looked adoringly back at him and shook her head.

“You quit, then I quit. Neither of us is starting back up again, got it?”

“Got it, princess,” he said, as he leaned down and kissed the tip of her nose before placing the cigarette back behind his ear.

She smiled. “The reporter from the Tampa paper is here for the interview you and Leo promised him. He’s outside in the hallway.” She gestured to the door we’d come through. “Get started, and I’ll meet you in a minute.”

“Nice to meet you guys,” Zack said before he left. “Stick around after the show. We’d love to hang out some more.”

“It was nice meeting you,” Josh said, shaking his hand. “And hey, just remember The Black Keys made it big because of their music being in commercials, and that song by Imagine Dragons has been tied to a few commercials and movie trailers this summer alone.”

Zack paused, listening to Josh. “Thanks, man. I appreciate that.”

Josh nodded his head. “You got it.”

“He seems stressed,” Molly said to Emily as soon as Zack had disappeared out the door.

Emily nodded. “He is. It’s hard being away from Lily, and with the pace we’ve been going, I don’t know when we’ll get home again in the next few weeks.”

“I’ll move some things around,” Molly said automatically, her eyes never leaving Zack as he slipped out the door. “Maybe from Miami, you guys can fly back home and then meet us in Tuscaloosa.”

Emily nodded. “He’d appreciate that.” Then she turned to us. “Sorry things are so crazy back here, but this is life, pre-show.” She shook her head. “There are beers in the fridge and snacks on top. Just don’t touch Derrick’s pork rinds. He’s weird about them.”

“I need to go check in with the sound engineer,” Molly said then, as her gaze drifted toward the faint sounds coming from the stage. “There’s feedback coming from the left front speaker, and no one seems to be hearing it.”

As soon as she was gone, Taryn told us she was going to get a soda. I think she might have been sensing that Josh and I needed to talk. He pulled me into a corner, and although he didn’t let go, he did loosen his grip around me.

He dropped his forehead to mine. “I love you, Taylor. That’s all you need to know, okay?”

I took a deep breath. I knew I’d acted like I didn’t care, and quite honestly I didn’t, but a little part of me felt like I didn’t really know Josh, and that didn’t sit right with me.

“So, let me piece together what happened three years ago, and I’m guessing, right before you moved back here.” He nodded. “You went to the beach on vacation, met Molly, spent two weeks getting high and having sex. Is that the gist?”

He nodded glumly. “I only did ecstasy the first night, but yeah, the sex part is accurate. It wasn’t my proudest moment, but to my credit I’d been dealing with some pretty big life stuff that summer that I didn’t want to face. I was a little lost and needed a really good distraction, and Molly was that.”

“Are you still attracted to her?”

“No,” he said quickly, but it sounded completely sincere. “
I wasn’t kidding when I said I’ve
been in love
with
you for a while, Tay. I meant that, and although I can’t change the past, I can
work my hardest to prove to you that you’re the only girl I want to think about for the rest of my life.”

My eyebrows rose in surprise, and Josh gave me a nervous, smirky smile.

“I knew I’d catch you off guard with that one.”

“But you’re Josh Nolan, the eternal bachelor, the boy who never wants to grow up. You’re the guy who bolts after a girl mentions living together, forget ring shopping or babies. Are you seriously telling me you’re thinking about a long term commitment?”

He pulled me close again. “Swift, I’m thinking about
the
long term commitment – with you.”

“But we’ve only been together for twenty-four hours.”

“Twenty-seven,” he corrected me, his mouth quirking up on the left side. “And longer if you count from Saturday night which is when you kissed me. Or you could count from the first time I told you I loved you.”

“Um, that would be yesterday,” I reminded him.

He shook his head. “That would be a few weeks ago. I was drunk, but I remember looking at you and thinking you were the most beautiful girl I’d ever known, so I told you how I felt. Of course, you weren’t inside my head, so you had no clue where I was coming from, and you freaked out, so I had to pretend like I’d passed out, but yeah, that was the first time.”

I’m pretty sure my eyebrows hit my h
airline with that disclosure. “So y
ou
did remember what happened.
You told me you didn’t mean what you said that night, that you were drunk.”

He cocked his head to the side.

“You lied to me?” I deduced.

He raised his index finger to correct me. “I do believe
I artfully avoided answering your question, because
I couldn’t believe my drunk ass told you
I loved you
after I slobbered all over you, but it was completely true.”

I smiled up at him, my heart swelling as I saw the sincerity in his eyes. “It really was the worst kiss ever.”

He leaned down and gently pressed his lips to mine, moving our mouths in tandem, as he slowly touched his tongue to mine and massaged it gently. When he pulled back, he left me breathless.

“Best kiss ever,” I whispered before diving back in for another.

Chapter 18

“Aww! That is so adorable!” Allison shrieked when she walked
upstairs
almost two weeks later.

“Uh,” I groaned, burying my face in Josh’s chest. We were attempting to sleep in, but apparently Allison and her loud mouth weren’t going to allow that. “Make her go away.”

“Go away, Al,” Josh grumbled, as he tu
rned and pulled me against him
so my back was to his front. He ki
ssed the back
of my head. “We’re sleeping.”

“In the same bed,” she said, and I felt her weight depress the mattress.

“That’s what people do when they’re dating,” I mumbled.

“And naked,” Josh chimed in, and Allison was up off the bed in two seconds.

“Eww, gross.”

“Yeah, well maybe you should think twice before entering other people’s bedrooms without knocking.”

“The door was open.”

“Because no one else was here. If we want to run around naked and have sex in every room of the house, we’ll do it. Now get your stuff and get out, so we can have some peace.”

Allison made a whimpering noise as her jaw dropped. I elbowed Josh in the ribs to let him know he’d taken things too far. He grunted in response, but didn’t say anything, so I did it again.

“I’ll be in my room,” Allison said before she stomped off in a huff, slamming the bedroom door behind her.

“What is the big idea?!” Josh demanded.

Man, he was grumpy in the morning.