Nicole Edwards - Zane

♂♀

No matter what Zane told himself, he hadn’t been able to stay away from V. Watching her as she danced with Beau had been too much. Although he knew his best friend wasn’t hitting on her, he still couldn’t help but think that he should’ve been the one holding V in his arms.

It didn’t take him long to piss Tessa the Stripper off, and when she finally realized he wasn’t buying what she was selling, she moved on. Hell, she had an entire table of guys willing to give her at least a few minutes of attention, although he’d be surprised if any of them actually intended to pursue her past the little strip tease she was offering. Zane didn’t have any interest whatsoever. When he’d looked over to see V staring back at him, Zane recognized the jealousy on her face. Not that he was happy about it, but it told him everything he needed to know.

So walking away from him hadn’t been easy for her.

That made two of them.

Standing in the darkened hallway, having to dodge people as they moved in and out of the bathrooms at the end of the hall, Zane wished he could sneak out with V in tow. He wanted to talk to her and he didn’t, all at the same time.

“I missed you.”

V’s sudden admission wrecked him in ways he hadn’t expected. Quite frankly, Zane figured V was going to blow him off in a big way. To hear her admit that she missed him was something his heart hadn’t been prepared for it.

Lifting her chin, Zane made her look at him. He stared down at her for a long time, trying desperately to read her intentions. He didn’t want to hear what she had to say if she was going to try and brush him off again. Selfish or not, Zane wanted to move forward with her in more ways than one. Not the other way around.

They needed to focus on healing each other, not continuing to try and increase the distance between them.

“Want to get out of here?” He hoped she would say yes, although he knew the party wasn’t over. Considering their moods, they probably weren’t livening up the party much anyway.

“I can’t leave Zoey,” she stated.

Zane merely nodded, then took a step back from her. He knew this wasn’t going to go the way he wanted it to and honestly, he was tired of being the one to pursue her. He wanted to be with her. Hell, he’d even considered asking her to marry him, but from the look she was giving him, he was receiving the brush off.

When he went to walk away, V grabbed his arm, and he stopped. He didn’t turn to look at her. He couldn’t. To hear her tell him it was over would be too much.

“Can we go back to your room when the party is over?” she asked, her hand still on his arm. “To, you know, talk?”

Zane did turn that time. “You want to talk?”

“Yes. There are some things we need to talk about. But, if you’d rather we wait until we get home, I understand that too.”

Zane knew they’d be on a plane back to Austin first thing in the morning, but he wasn’t sure he could wait that long to talk to her. He needed to though. It wasn’t like he could displace Beau for the night anyway. Not that he couldn’t share a room with someone else, but Zane didn’t want to.

“When we get home.” Zane found himself saying. “I’ll come to your house when we get back –” Zane held up his hand to stop her when she tried to interrupt. “This isn’t up to you right now, V. When we get home tomorrow morning, I’m coming over. We’ll talk then. But that’s it. We figure it out then, or we both walk away. Understand?”

He was tired of playing games. As much as he hated to think he could very well be ending this relationship as he knew it, Zane wasn’t willing to continue moving in circles. For the longest time, he’d thought they were moving forward, at least inch by inch. These last few days had proven that he was wrong. They weren’t getting any closer to solving these issues between them. It was time they put the past behind them. Moving forward was his only option from here on out.

♂♀

By the time Zane was on his way to V’s, the day was more than half over. The morning had been hectic, getting to the airport in Vegas, getting on the plane and then finally pulling into his driveway had taken a little over five hours. Truthfully, after the night before, he really just wanted to fall into bed for a couple of hours. After he and V had opted to wait to talk, they’d returned to the party and even though they didn’t talk much, they’d managed to liven things up a little.

In true twin fashion, they’d had three more strippers come join the party and no one could ever call Zoey sweet and innocent anymore. She’d helped the strippers tease both Kaleb and Gage, which if no one had known that the three of them were doing the deed together, they sure did now. When Zoey kissed one of the strippers, Zane thought the bar was going to erupt. His dick had sure enjoyed the sight, but thankfully, he drowned his hormones with alcohol.

At one point, Gage and Travis had been talking, and despite the aggressive way they regarded each other, Zane could sense another kind of tension between them. Strange. Very, very strange. He tried to blame it on the vodka, but now he wasn’t so sure. Maybe he was just seeing things. After what happened between him and Beau, it was quite possible his mind was playing tricks on him. Just because he had experimented, didn’t mean everyone was.

Then again, Zane hadn’t imagined what happened between Ethan and Blake. He’d been innocently on his way to the bathroom to take a leak and lo and behold, right there in the hallway, Blake was pressed up against Ethan, their mouths locked together. Not even a crowbar would’ve pried those two apart. He pretended not to see anything and went about his business.

What the fuck? Shaking off the thoughts of his brothers with men, Zane focused on driving to V’s. Just as a precaution, he’d called Travis and Beau beforehand. Not that he expected anything to happen, but Zane wasn’t interested in getting his ass handed to him again. He wasn’t feeling one hundred percent at the moment as it was. Being precautious wasn’t a bad thing, he reminded himself.

He managed to arrive at V’s without incident, making it through her front door without a second thought. When he saw her, his mind blanked, and he could think of nothing except stripping her down right there in the living room and burying himself deep in her body. So deep, she would never be able to run from him again.

“Hey,” she greeted, slipping behind him and locking the front door. He knew she thought she was being discrete, but it hadn’t worked.

“Hungry?” she asked as she turned back to the kitchen.

“Yeah,” he mumbled, not referring to food. He was hungry all right. He wanted to lift up that dress and feast on what he found underneath. In fact, he fully intended to do so in the next few minutes. If she’d let him.

He followed her to the kitchen and found she’d been passing the time cooking. It smelled delicious. Almost as good as that distinctively spicy fragrance of her skin. His hands itched to touch her, and his mouth watered.

“V.”

The moment she turned to look at him, Zane’s heart pounded hard. A fast, painful thump in his chest. She was so damn beautiful. Her long, chocolate brown hair hanging in waves around her face, flowing over her breasts. The succulent curves that were outlined by that dress. Her feet were bare, which wasn’t usual, and he took a moment, admiring her pretty purple tipped toes. Purple. An unusual color for fingernail polish, but he suddenly loved the color purple.

“Hmmm?”

Her response was but a whisper and he knew she felt it. Whatever it was. She felt it too. He knew she did.