Page 17 of Hard Rock Temptation
Micah nodded. “I remember. I showed it to Finn and he got all cranky that we’d come up with something that cool and he hadn’t.”
“Well, I was never really happy with the melody,” I said, getting excited as I explained my vision. “It didn’t seem to fit the lyrics. And if I have to choose between changing the sound and changing the words…”
“I know, you’ll keep the words any day,” he chuckled.
“Exactly!” I said with a grin.
Micah brought the two mugs and set them down on the coffee table. He was wearing a short-sleeved t-shirt, his tattooed arms on display. Even though I’d been there while he’d gotten some of them, the sight still made my heart quicken.
Micah wasn’t jacked like Chris, who spent all his free time in our home gym, but his forearms were toned and his fingers were long and deft. My mind swiftly went to a dozen dirty places, places that I wished I could explore within in the confines of my own daydreams, but I didn’t appreciate the wayward thoughts right then.
Micah took a seat on the opposite side of the sofa, leaving my notebook and his laptop resting on the middle cushion. It put some distance between us, more distance than usual. There was a time when we would have crowded together as we bent over his laptop, hip to hip and heads bowed toward one another.
That was then, I had to remind myself. This was now. Things were different.Wewere different. Micah was keeping hisdistance, emotionally and physically. Things wouldn’t be the same as before, but maybe there was a way we could move forward together, in a different way.
Micah opened the project file in his music producing software and I pulled the laptop closer to me so I could mess around with the tracks.
I was so involved with the work that I barely noticed that he had gone silent. I looked up from the laptop.
“What’s up?” I asked. “Not feeling the song?”
“It’s not that,” he said tightly.
Micah turned on the sofa, facing me. Our knees touched, pressing together. With one leg under me and the other dangling over the edge of the sofa, Micah’s leg ended up pressed right against mine. If he moved a few inches over we could have played footsies with our socked feet.
I refused to think that butterflies were fluttering in my stomach, because that was the kind of trite nonsense Micah would say, but there was definitelysomekind of fluttering down there.
I found myself looking into adoring brown eyes. Then his gaze lowered to stare at my lips. His breathing turned shallow, pupils dilating. I held still, not wanting to move and break whatever spell had been cast over us.
Micah moved in slightly, getting closer. His face was mere inches from mine. I held my breath, not daring to break the moment. His gaze lifted from my lips to my eyes, soulful brown staring into rich green. The spark of hunger I saw there made the fluttering swell up in a flurry.
I let out a shaky breath, almost a gasp.
The spell broke. The hunger turned panicked. Micah backed up until he was squished into the far corner of the sofa.
“Shit,” he cursed quietly to himself. Then he roughly scrubbed his hand over his face and cursed again, groaning into his palm. “Shit.” Then, without looking up, he said, “Kay, I think you should go home now.”
The confused mess of emotions swirling in my gut was hard to decipher. Along with disappointment there were definitely shades of disbelief, but, underneath all that was simply a feeling of grief. Of loss.
“Do you really want me to leave?” I asked, not showing any intention of getting up. “Or do you justthinkI should leave?”
“That’s the same thing,” he said dully into his palm.
“It really isn’t.”
“Kaylee,” Micah started, halting. “It’s time we address?—”
“If you say,address the elephant in the room, I’m going to scream,” I cut in.
“Kay…” He inhaled deeply and tipped his head back to stare at a spot above my head. “I know what you’re thinking,” he said. “But we can’t. You’re too young.”
“Bullshit,” I called him out without hesitation.
“You’re barely legal,” he pressed.
“I’m nineteen, and I have been for half a year now,” I said. “Soon I’m going to be twenty and you’re going to have to come up with another excuse.” I held up my hand as soon as he opened his mouth to protest. “Because Iknowit’s an excuse, Micah.”
“It’s not an excuse!” he insisted. “You’re young.”
