A Filthy Friend (Filthy Line #5) - Jaxson Kidman Page 0,65

would work out. But money can’t change someone’s heart, wants or needs.”

“No shit,” Jay said.

“So what are you going to do?” Reed asked.

“First…” I turned around. “I’m going to apologize for what I just said to you… Dex.”

Dex nodded. “It’s all good. Candice is fucking beautiful. Who wouldn’t dream of her on her knees… right?”

“Liv,” I said.

“Don’t bother,” she said. “You never stood a chance with me. I’d rip your dick off and make you eat it.”

“She would,” Nash said.

I lowered my head. “It’s been a fucked-up ride here…”

I lifted my head and the door opened again.

In came Candice, Abby, and Wren.

“What did we miss?” Candice asked.

“Oh, nothing,” Dex said. “Sab was just fantasizing about you.”

“Me?” Candice asked.

She looked at me and I winked.

Dex moved to Candice and put his arm around her.

“This is weird,” I said. “Too many people in here. And everyone is dressed.”

“Where’s Bree?” Abby asked.

“Gone,” I said.

“You messed it up?” Wren asked.

“Maybe,” I said.

“She’s hurting,” Wren said. “I know what that’s like.”

Jay put his arm around Wren and kissed the top of her head.

“We’re all hurting,” Nash said.

I swallowed hard. “If we ever end a show like this again, I’m quitting the band.”

“There’s only one way to keep it from happening,” Reed said.

“How?” I asked.

“Do something about it.”

22

BREE

I looked through the orders and looked at my phone.

Back and forth.

Back and forth.

Mia came through the front door with coffees.

“Thank you,” I called out.

“It comes with a price,” she said.

“Of course it does,” I said. “What now?”

“Do you remember my great grandmother?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Do you remember when we’d sit outside and she’d tell us a storm was coming?”

“Yes.”

“She always knew. Do you remember what she used to say?”

“About it being so calm?”

“Exactly,” Mia said.

“What’s your point?” I asked.

I reached for my coffee and she took it away. “That’s you, Bree.”

“What?”

“The calm. You haven’t said a thing since you got back. You went from crying and being a mess to leaving to suddenly coming back to…”

“Back to normal,” I said. “This is my life, Mia. Right here. It’s where I belong.”

“So you and Sab are just friends again?”

“What we’ve always been.”

“You haven’t heard from him,” she said. “And you stare at your phone like it’s going to stand up and walk away.”

“Observant?”

“Always,” Mia said.

I let out a long sigh. “Okay. Sab went behind my back and found my birth parents. They’re alive. I didn’t tell him to do that. Because… I made the decision I don’t want to know them. I don’t want to know about them. I don’t want to meet them. I have no desire. My mother raised me. And she died. It was tragic. But I’m not going to then suddenly find my birth parents and hope for something else.”

“Shit,” Mia said.

“On top of that, what was I going to do? Just stay with him? In Los Angeles? To do what? I have a life here. I have a job here. I have to face everything here. It’s been hard this past week, Mia. Finally facing my mother’s death. Going through the motions of everyone wanting to talk about her.”

“And you’re doing it alone,” she said. “What about Sab?”

“Exactly. What about him? He’s where he belongs.”

“If you called him right now, he’d show up.”

“I know.”

“So…”

“So what?” I asked. I grabbed the coffee from her. “I am not going to mess up his life. I am not going to carry that burden on me. Just like he’s not going to carry the burden of taking care of me if I were to move to Los Angeles.”

“Is that something you want to do?” Mia asked.

“No.”

“Have you even considered it?”

“No.”

“So you’re being stubborn.”

“I’m right where I belong,” I said. I turned the clipboard around. “We’re swamped with orders.”

Mia put her hand over the paper on the clipboard. “I’ll make you a deal.”

“What?” I asked.

“We work all day,” she said. “I don’t say a word about you and Sab.”

“Okay. What’s the catch?”

“Tonight,” she said. “I’m coming over and you’re telling me everything. And I mean… everything.”

I felt myself blushing.

I couldn’t help myself either.

That only made Mia smile because she knew there was no way in hell I went to Los Angeles and didn’t end up in bed with Sab.

She wasn’t wrong with that assumption either.

No man would ever come close to Sab…

“Fine,” I said. “Just shut up and work.”

Mia took the clipboard and walked away happy.

I looked at my phone again.

Maybe it was all over…

And maybe that was a good thing.

I pressed my middle fingers to the corners of my eyes