Chapter Five

 

Brooke arched an eyebrow and joked. “Yes.”

“Oh, sorry.” He scooted the chair back under the table.

She clutched his wrist to stop him from leaving. Whew. Warmth washed over her. “I’m kidding.”

“Good,” he said, and dropped into the seat next to her.

An attractive couple approached the other empty seats. “Hey, Warren, okay if we join you?”

“Sure thing. Byrnsey, Kenya, this is CJ’s sister Brooke. Brooke, this is Captain Patrick and Mrs. Kenya Byrnes. He works with your brother, and Kenya’s a music teacher who tolerates poker night at her house once a month.”

“Nice to meet you.” Brooke waved as the couple seated themselves.

“Likewise,” Byrnsey said. “CJ brags that you’re a big-time musician.”

“I’d call me medium-time,” she deflected.

Kenya threw a warm smile at her. “Well, I can’t wait to hear you play.”

“Thank you.” Brooke hid her frown with her water glass. If she messed up The Throne Room in front of CJ’s nearest and dearest tomorrow, her soul would leave her body.

Luke leaned in close. “Are you okay? You’re really pale.”

“Fine.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “Between the time zone change and all the activities, I’m just a little worn out.”

“Dinner will help,” Byrnsey said. “The food here’s amazing. Isn’t this where they had their first date?”

“First official one, yeah.” Luke lifted a tortilla chip from their table’s basket and dragged it through the salsa verde. As he crunched it, her stomach twisted. She couldn’t eat with the stress circuiting her body.

“Excuse me for a moment.” She backed away from the table and rushed to the ladies’ room to splash cold water on her face. Ugh, Luke was right. She was whiter than the sink’s porcelain. How soon could she leave without ruffling feathers? An hour? Oh God, an hour from now she’d be climbing the walls.

The door opened, and Helena’s belly entered a second before the rest of her.

“I swear I pee every ten minutes.” The happy crinkles around Helena’s eyes disappeared when she locked onto Brooke. “Are you okay?”

She gripped the sink behind her. “I might be verging on a panic attack.”

“Why?” Helena placed her hand on Brooke’s forehead.

“Performance anxiety. I haven’t practiced enough, and I want everything to be perfect.”

Helena lowered her hand. “The wedding’s supposed to be fun, Brooke, not cause a panic attack. We can use recorded music, but if you really want to play tomorrow you can leave dinner to practice.”

Tension eased from Brooke. “But my parents—”

“I’ll explain it to your family. Do what you need to do.”

Grateful tears misted her eyes as she hugged Helena tight. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome, but if you don’t let go, I might pee on you.”

“Duly noted,” she said. “See you tomorrow?”

“I’ll be the one in white. Now go before your mom catches you.”

Brooke hurried from the bathroom and skulked past the private dining room like a Scooby Doo villain. Outside, she fired up her phone, poking her ride share app.

“You’re leaving?” Luke asked from behind her.

Her attraction to him battled with her stress, but stress won. Stress always won.

“I need to practice The Throne Room.”

“Want a ride?”

“You can’t leave the taco goodness in there. Besides, my ride’s…” Fuck. “Twenty minutes away.”

“I can give you a ride and be back here in time for the flan. Come on, my car’s this way.” He strolled backward, spinning his keys on his index finger and waiting for her to follow. Between the kindness in his eyes and the way the corner of his mouth hooked upward, resistance was impossible.

~ * ~

Night had fallen while they were in the restaurant, and the bustling bright city had come alive. Luke gripped the steering wheel and glanced Brooke’s way. With her bottom lip tucked between her teeth, she’d barely spoken during the trip. Not even an ooh or an aah when they passed the spurting Bellagio fountains.

“Almost there,” he said.

“I can tell.” She pointed toward The Stratosphere, rising tall and lit up like diamonds.

More silence as he rolled north on Las Vegas Boulevard. A minute later they eased into the hotel drop-off loop, but he couldn’t let her go without offering encouragement. “I’m sure you’ll be great.”

Brooke made zero moves to leave his gently rumbling truck. Finally, after a deep breath, she asked, “Come upstairs with me?”

His groin throbbed, and he shifted into park. Her request was a total no-go.

“I want you to listen to me play The Throne Room,” she explained. “You know what the song sounds like, right? I bet you’ve seen the movie dozens of times.”

“More like hundreds.” He relaxed his grip on the gearshift knob. “But does it matter? The wedding’s tomorrow.”

“I’m horrifically aware.” She laced her fingers together and planted her face in them. “One of the joys of being me is that I have impossible last-minute ideas, and I’ll hate myself if I don’t pull it off.”

“They’ll love whatever you do.”

“Untrue. They’ll appreciate it, but they won’t love it. Too many people treat classical music like background noise, so I want to play a special a song they’d recognize.” She sucked in a deep breath and smoothed her hair back from her forehead. “Sorry. I don’t normally let people see me like this.”

He held tight to the steering wheel to stop himself from folding her in his arms and soothing away her stress. A protective urge like this was dangerous because hugs turned into caresses, which turned into other, impossible things. With Brooke, anyway.

He cleared his throat.

“Please?” Brooke blinked her shiny brown eyes at him. “Ten minutes, that’s all it’ll take.”

Ah, fuck it. Ten minutes up and back. He could behave for that long.

“Okay,” he said, and scrubbed his chin.

“You will? Thank you.” She hit the release button on seat belt, and it slithered back into the car.

He followed and handed his key to the valet. “I’ll only be about ten minutes.”

Inside the hotel’s elevator, Brooke hit her floor number, and the car shot them skyward. With each floor his pulse kicked up a notch. Slow your roll. He was helping his friend’s kid sister who’d nearly fainted from anxiety. That’s all.

The doors opened and released them onto the sixteenth floor.

“My room’s this way.” After veering left, she stopped four doors down. The lock clunked as the sensor registered her key card, and she opened the door.

His heart skipped a beat. Dude, chill. All she wanted was his opinion, for fuck’s sake. He followed her inside the darkened room. Was it warm in here? The only light was the Vegas neon sparkling from the street below.

She flicked on the lamp on the desk. “Grab a seat wherever while I tune up.”

He sat on the foot of the bed and shrugged off his jacket before he sweated through his shirt.

Brooke opened her violin case and withdrew her bow. The slender wood and horsehair appeared to be delicate, an item Luke could snap one-handed. In her grip, though, the bow was a precision tool like a scalpel. It could wound him or heal him depending on how she wielded it.

After fixing the violin under her chin, Brooke played a practice scale.

“Your violin’s quiet,” he said.

She directed her shadowed gaze toward him. “I put my mute on the bridge so I don’t disturb anyone. I haven’t heard any screaming orgasms on this floor, so I’m assuming the walls are thick, but why take the chance?” She took a deep breath. “Now, remember, please be honest with me.”

“Scout’s honor.” He held up three fingers.

“Ugh, you were Boy Scout?”

“Eagle Scout.” He’d listed it on his job application for the agency. Believe it or not, that shit carried weight with the Department of Defense.

“Of course you were. Ready?”

For a moment, she hovered her bow. After a sharp intake of breath, she brought it down to kiss the strings. Unmistakably, The Throne Room’s opening notes rose from her violin. A tingly chill whisked over him from his scalp to his soles. As she played, Brooke’s corded forearms and the impossible angles of her fingers mesmerized him as much as the music. She eased into the piece’s softer, subtler notes then returned to rousing regal strength for the big finish.

“Well?” she asked, chest heaving.

Witnessing a person doing exactly what they were put on this Earth to do was gift and a privilege. It rendered his heart calm, his brain lively, and his spirit bright.

He’d sound like a certifiable nut if he admitted any of that. Instead, he swiped a tear from his eye and said, “The first ten seconds were fast, but the rest was perfect. I got chills.”

She twirled. “Really?”

“Yeah. I’m not a bullshitter.”

“Let me do it again—slower at the beginning, like you said. Can you listen one more time?”

He shouldn’t. This reaction he was having to her was new and, if he was being honest, scary. Plenty of women had touched his body, but until now, none had touched his soul.

“The rehearsal dinner…”

“Please? It’s only two minutes.”

There was the please again, dammit. “Okay, two minutes then I’ve gotta go.”

“Understood.” She raised her bow and played again. This time, she paced the music perfectly, start to finish. Again goosebumps. Apparently, that was his standard reaction to her now.

“That was golden.” He pushed off the bed. “CJ’ll love it. You must’ve worked hard.”

“I did.” She set her bow and violin in her case and her cheeks glowed in the lamplight. “I don’t usually admit that, but I really did. Some people think if you can read music you can instantly play what’s on the page, but it’s not like that. There’s study and trial and error and perfection. Once I’ve accomplished that, I bring emotion back into it because music is supposed to be what feelings sound like.”

Inviting an evaluation of a performance must be like opening a vein and asking the critic to tell you if you bled well. He wouldn’t have the stones to do the same. Since he was thirteen, his walls had been sky high, and her level of voluntary vulnerability blew his mind.

“Anyway.” She headed to the door. “Thanks for listening. Have a taco for me.”

The harsh hallway light flooded the room as she opened the door.

“You’re welcome,” he said. “I’ll see you tomorrow?”

She chuckled and tilted her head up to him.

He might have left without touching her and spent the rest of his life wondering what would’ve happened next. Might have…until she licked her full, heart-shaped lips as she stared straight into his eyes.

He was a goner.

Instinct took over. Luke curved toward her and planted his eager mouth on hers, tasting her sweet softness. Earlier, at the licensing office, her kiss had caught him by surprise, and he’d given hardly anything back. Here in her hotel room’s hushed quiet, with the crimson, purple, and green lights of Vegas shining in the distance, he’d give her everything he had.

After an eternity and no time at all, she broke the kiss and murmured, “We can’t do this, remember?”

Desire stormed inside, but she was right. A night with her, as much as he wanted it, would cost him his best friend. Peeling himself from her was almost impossible, but Luke was skilled at impossible.

“You’re right,” he said.

“I know.” She chuckled and ran her thumb over his jaw, then nudged him toward the door. “You have to leave because I can’t go to the wedding with a beard burn. So drive safe, Luke Warren, and I’ll see you tomorrow.”

She closed the door and the lock clunked. Her willpower had saved him, but a raging case of blue balls interfered with his gratitude. Luke paced away from her door and jabbed the elevator button. After the car arrived and he stepped inside, it announced, “Going down.”

Goddamn, he’d like to.

~ * ~

Brooke leaned against the door, soaking in its cold surface. Heat had simmered between the two of them all day, but she’d never expected Luke to take a shot. She flipped the security lock and padded back to her violin, but she couldn’t focus enough to play. Five minutes. She’d give herself five minutes to ponder Luke’s face-meltingly hot kiss then she’d get back to practice.

Or… She cut her gaze to the hotel alarm clock. Close to midnight at home, but her friends would be up. Brooke opened the video chat app on her phone and dialed Melinda.

“How’s Vegas?” her roommate asked after picking up on the third ring.

“I have no idea. I’ve been helping with wedding errands. How’re things there?”

“Zara’s at her studio, I’m watching Bridesmaids, and Grier’s prepping for Dee’s wedding.” Melinda’s eyes tracked something beyond the phone. “There she goes now. Say hi to Brooke, Grier!”

Grier popped her face over the edge of the couch and waved. “Hi! You don’t know where I left my light meter, do you?”

“Um, I saw it on the dining room table three days ago.”

“Thanks, I’ll check.” She disappeared.

“She’s nervous,” Melinda whispered.

“It’s a lot of pressure to photograph your boyfriend’s sister’s wedding. Playing violin for your brother’s wedding is scary, too.”

“Nerves getting to you?”

“Yeah, a little.” Her stress was lower after playing for Luke, but still too high for her liking.

“A little nervousness keeps you on your toes, but the only way to beat a big nervous is practice.”

“That’s why I cut out of dinner early.” Brooke flopped onto her bed. “I haven’t been able to clock the practice hours to make sure it’s perfect. I swear that if I’m this stressed about a wedding, when and if I’m invited to audition for the CSO I’ll lock myself up for the full ten-week prep period.”

Melinda tilted her head. “You haven’t heard from them yet?”

“No.” She swallowed to try to clear the sour taste crowding the back of her throat. Patience was crucial in this business, but the lack of response from the CSO bugged her.

Grier reappeared, holding the light meter. “Brooke, you’re a godsend. It was in the dining room. Hang on.” She squinted. “Whose jacket is that?”

Brooke glanced behind her. Shit, Luke forgot his blazer. “Mine.”

“Please, I know every stitch of clothing the women in this house possess, and that is not your garment.” Grier leaned closer until her eye filled the screen. “That’s a man’s blazer. A nice one, too. Brooke, do you have a boy in your room?”

“No.” She chewed her lip. “Not anymore.”

“Eep! Tell us everything,” Grier demanded. “Who is he?”

“My brother’s best man. His name’s Luke, but nothing’s happening. Except…he kissed me.” She shifted her gaze back and forth between her friends. “I mean, I kissed him earlier today too, but that one was fake.”

She kept the reason for the fake kiss to herself. Explaining the marriage license situation was impossible.

“Are you high?” Melinda asked. “’Cause you’re deadass confusing.”

“I know. The thing is, CJ’s best friend is hot and really nice, but I’d rather not deal with the fallout of a one-night stand.”

Grier knitted her brows. “What fallout?”

“Did you miss the whole brother’s best friend part?”

“But he lives in Vegas,” Melinda said. “You’ll never see him again. You come back here, he stays there, which means no expectations beyond this weekend. What are the chances you’ll be back in Vegas soon?”

Brooke curled her fingers around his blazer. “None.”

“And doesn’t CJ move around all the time for work?”

“Yeah. They think they’ll get a new post in a couple of months.”

Melinda shrugged. “Then you can go for it.”

Grier shot a confused glance at Melinda. “But you’re anti-hookup.”

“For me,” Melinda said. “Whatever y’all do is your business.”

“I’m not hooking up with anyone, but thank you for the consultation.” She stretched languidly, grateful she’d spontaneously dialed her friends. When she talked to them it had the same effect as sipping a glass of wine in a bubble bath, and she was in a much better headspace for violin.

“Not to cut this short, but I have a big day tomorrow,” Grier said. “But you’re good?”

“Yes, thank you,” Brooke said.

“Good. ’Night sweetie.”

“Break a leg.” Melinda blew her a kiss and ended the call.

Brooke picked up Luke’s blazer and tossed it on the side chair. The cologne clinging to it puffed into the air, and Brooke breathed deeply, refusing to admit she wished the man were here.

~ * ~

Nine hours later, Brooke slapped her phone’s happy alarm and stumbled into the bathroom. After the call with her friends, she’d practiced until the early morning hours. First, she perfected The Throne Room then played all of her intended pieces by heart. Finally, she played for the joy of it, and the stresses from the past few days—family bickering, jumping back to adolescent frustrations, flirty taboos with Luke—melted away.

Making music was her career, her therapy, her pleasure.

Brooke flipped back the covers then squinted at her phone. Nine a.m. She’d gotten five hours of sleep. Not great, but she couldn’t stay in bed. For her whole life, she was a bitchy mess for an hour after waking. To be a pleasant participant in the wedding morning beautification rituals, she’d better get up.

Brooke rubbed her face, clearing the sand from her eyes.

She checked the phone again—9:02 AM, and she’d missed some texts. Aw, her sweetheart roommates sent good luck messages. She sent a smoochy thank you and a similar message to Grier then stumbled from bed. Coffee and a healthy squeeze of eye drops would cure the grainy sensation behind her eyelids. She prepped the in-room coffee pot to brew while she readied herself for the day.

In the bathroom, she twisted the shower knob until it rained steaming water. When she swiveled back to the sink, a zombie with wild hair, bags under her eyes, and a sleep-creased face stared back from the mirror. She laughed and squeezed a blob of paste on toothbrush.

Good thing today wasn’t her wedding day.