A few female fans did eye Kellan, but nothing more than the I-want-you eyes I was used to him getting. None of them seemed quite brave enough, or drunk enough, to approach his table, though, and I was just fine with that.

Throughout the course of the evening, the D-bags eventually left their bar. Matt left by himself an hour or two after arriving, a shy smile on his face as he said that he had plans with Rachel. Griffin rolled his eyes as his cousin left, gesturing obscenely with his hand in the air over his naughty parts. Thankfully, he left about an hour later, some blonde bimbo on his arm. She gave him sultry, seductive eyes as they left, and I was pretty sure she'd give him the praise he'd wanted earlier. I shook my head and ignored the sight of Griffin leaving with another woman. It happened all the time. I'd asked Anna about it once, but she'd only shrugged and said she didn't care. He was free to do whatever he wanted. Her too.

Evan stayed until closing, escorting Jenny out when she was done with her duties. Kellan stayed, too. Feet kicked up on a chair, he watched me with a deliciously provocative smile while I wiped off some tables nearby. And Rita watched him just as provocatively.

Yep, everything was back to normal.

Refusing to sleep in my bed again, Kellan drove us to his place instead. A small, peaceful smile was on his lips as he pulled onto his street. I wasn't sure if that was because he was coming home after a couple of days, or if he just enjoyed having me come home with him. I supposed it was a little of both.

His tiny, white two-story house was dark as he shut the car off. When we'd all lived there, Kellan, Denny and me, the house had seemed warm and alive with activity. Now that it was just Kellan, the house seemed a little quiet. As Kellan cracked his door, I thought maybe that was the real reason for his smile. Kellan preferred a bustling house. I'd gleaned that out of him when I'd asked him if he'd rent out his room again.

With a slight frown, he'd told me, "I've thought about it. But I don't know...it feels like yours, and I don't want to give it to someone else." Those words had warmed me considerably, but when I'd asked him if he needed the rent money, he'd only shrugged and said, "No, renting out the room was never about money." Sighing, he'd added, "I just don't like being there alone."

God, sometimes he just broke my heart.

Stepping into the entryway, my eyes drifted around the familiar space. It was sort of a double-edged sword for me. I loved being here with Kellan. I loved the memories of cuddling with him on the couch and making love to him in his room, but...Denny was here, too.

His ghost seemed to linger in the spaces he'd been. Leaning against the kitchen counter drinking a mug of tea. Lying back on the couch, watching sports on TV. Showering in the bathroom, sometimes with me. And our room, the first room we'd ever shared as a couple, was the room that Kellan refused to rent out again. The ghosts were heaviest in there. So heavy, that I refused to go in there. I couldn't even look at the door. As it was closed when Kellan and I walked into his bedroom, I thought that Kellan probably didn't go in there either. Like I said, double-edged sword.

Propping his guitar case in the corner of his room, finally having taken it out of his car from playing at Bumbershoot, Kellan watched me as I sat on his bed. With soft eyes, his vision flicked to the closed door across the very short hall upstairs. "You alright?"

Throwing on my brightest smile, I leaned back on my elbows. Kellan's face brightened considerably. "Of course, I'm fine." That was mainly true. I was fine. I'd let Denny go and I'd slowly begun to forgive myself for cheating on him. But being here was difficult for me sometimes and Kellan knew it. I think that was the real reason he didn't pressure me more to move in with him. I just wasn't ready to deal with the ghosts every day.

Sitting down beside me, he laid a palm on my thigh; it ignited me instantly. "I'm glad you're here," he whispered.

Sitting up, I laced my arms around his neck. "I had no choice. You wouldn't let me drive your car, remember?"

He chuckled and leaned in to kiss me. Lightly laughing myself, I threaded my fingers back through his shaggy hair and laid back on his pillows, bringing him with me.

He was instantly engaged, hands running over my body, his own body sneaking into position alongside mine. As I thought of all of the women who'd wanted him this weekend, women who he'd only briefly flirted with, or politely acknowledged, or in some cases completely ignored, my heart swelled. He didn't want them. He wanted me. He loved me. And God, how I loved him, too.

Chapter 3

Distractions

Kellan's room was still dark when my eyes peeled open. Moonlight filtered in through his window, highlighting the objects that he'd collected over his life. There wasn't much-some paperbacks on his bookshelf, a few CDs scattered along the top of it, the Ramones poster I'd picked up for him last summer while out shopping with Jenny. Besides some pocket change and a couple of well-used notebooks, the only thing on his dresser was a bottle of some sort of hair product. Kellan said that a woman from high school had turned him on to the stuff and he'd been using it ever since to "manage the mess." I was fairly certain from the slight smile on his face when he'd said it, that he literally meant the words "woman" and "turned on." His high school years scared me a little bit.

Other than our clothes strewn about the floor from last night, the only other things of note in his room were his guitars. His main guitar, the one still tucked away in its black carrying case, was leaning against the wall beside an older, clearly worn one. Since Kellan never used that one while playing, I figured he kept it for sentimental reasons. Plain and seemingly inexpensive, he'd told me it was the first guitar he'd ever had, and the only possession he'd taken to L.A. with him when he'd run away. It was quite possibly the only thing from Kellan's childhood that was a happy memory for him. And, since his parents had literally tossed everything of his when they'd moved to this house he'd inherited, it was also the only memento of his youth. His childhood scared me a little bit too, just for a completely different reason.

As I fingered the smaller, silver guitar around my neck, the symbolic keepsake of him that he'd given to me when we'd been breaking off our affair, a keepsake that never left my body, I twisted my head to look at what had awoken me.

The sheets tangled and twisted around his body, his bare chest silver in the faded light pouring through his window, Kellan moved restlessly beside me. His brow furrowed, his face distraught, he was shaking his head and murmuring something I couldn't make out. I twisted around to touch his cheek, but he flinched away from me like I'd hurt him.

"Kellan," I whispered, "you're dreaming...wake up."

His hand fisted the sheets near his hip. His breath picked up as he shook his head again and whimpered. Carefully adjusting my body to a comforting position beside him, I leaned over and soothingly hushed him. Draping my arm over his chest, I could feel how rapidly his heart was racing. Tears pricked my eyes as I wondered what he was dreaming about. With Kellan, it could be any number of horrible things.

Leaning my head against him, I kissed his shoulder. "Wake up, baby, it's just a dream."

He started saying, "No," then, "Please." His face cringed away from me. His legs drew up to reflexively curl into a ball. Kissing his shoulder again, I lightly shook him. "Kellan, wake up."

Taking quick, shallow inhales, his body trembled under my fingers. Just as I considered turning on his lamp to wake him up, he gasped and his eyes flew open. Immediately propping himself up onto his elbows, he shied away from my embrace. Looking around with wide eyes, he seemed lost, like he didn't know where he was. With his breath still quick and his body still quivering, he swallowed over and over.

I reached out and cupped his cheek, forcing his gaze to mine. His confused eyes narrowed. "Kiera?"

I nodded, scooting closer to him. "Yeah, it's me. You're okay. It was just a dream, Kellan."

His rigid posture slumped back and he closed his eyes and hung his head. "Just a dream," he muttered. My heart cracked a little watching his face. Kellan's bad dreams weren't really just dreams. They were more like memories. I wasn't sure which bad memory Kellan had been reliving, but I knew it had terrified him.

Inhaling slowly, he took a couple of deep breaths. When he was calmer, he peeked back up at me. Running a trembling hand across his mouth, he shook his head. "I'm sorry if I woke you up."

Swallowing the emotion in my throat, I flung my arms around him and crushed my bare body to his. His arms loosely came around me and I could still feel his heart surging as adrenaline coursed through him. "It's okay." Kissing his cheek, I gave him a few moments to collect himself. When he settled back down to the pillows, his fingers rubbing the bridge of his nose like he had a headache, I propped myself up on his chest. "You want to talk about it?"

Bringing my hands up to his temples, I pressed my thumbs into the soft spots, taking over his headache reducing massage. He closed his eyes and relaxed into my touch. "I was back at home and my dad..." he stopped and swallowed, "it was nothing...just a dream."

I bit my lip to stop my sigh. His past was just something he didn't like to talk about. In fact, I was pretty sure I was the only human on earth that he'd ever confessed his history to. While Evan was aware that he'd been beaten badly, since Kellan had drunkenly spilled the beans once, and Denny knew about the abuse, having witnessed it himself, Kellan had never told them that his father wasn't his father. No one else knew that his mother had had an affair on her husband and gotten pregnant by another man. Then that horrible woman had claimed that she'd been raped. Because of the lie, or maybe because of the truth, the man who'd raised Kellan had been brutal with him...and his mother had done nothing to stop it.

I hated them both.

"Are you sure you don't want to talk about it?" I whispered, kissing his jaw.

He stirred, inhaling deep. Opening his eyes, he gently pushed me off of him and rolled me to my side. Pressing his body into mine, his no longer shaking, he cupped my cheek and tilted my head up. Attaching his warm lips to my neck, he murmured, "Yes, I'm done with talking."

My heart picked up its pace as his hand left my cheek to run down my side. I knew he was diverting his mind with my body. I knew it, yet I couldn't seem to stop him from doing it. He pushed me to my back, leaning over me as his lips worked their way down my throat. My fingers automatically locked into that marvelous hair as every section of skin that he touched on me suddenly burned.

My breath was embarrassingly fast as his hand rubbed a circle into my hip. He was purposely avoiding every spot I most wanted him to touch and it was driving me crazy, shutting my mind off. I shoved his head down a smidge when he kissed along the top of my breast and he chuckled before conceding. All thought of his earlier grief was gone from both of us as his mouth closed around a nipple, his tongue drawing a circle around the peak. Aching, I cried out and rocked my h*ps towards him.

A deep sound of satisfaction rising up his throat, he seemed just as pleased being the one giving the pleasure as I was receiving it. As his teeth lightly dragged across my tender flesh, his finger, equally as light, ran right between my legs. I was already ready for him; I think I was in a constant state of semi-arousal just being near him. I arched my back and ran my hands over my face and through my hair.