"If he finds out about Jeff, he won't want anything to do with me anymore."

"I won't tell him if you don't."

"Maybe I should tell him."

"Oh." I adjust my grip on the steering wheel and think about how to respond. "Do you want to end things with him?"

"No... Yes... I don't know." She blows air through her lips, exasperated. "Are you going to tell Gage?"

Regret is a sharp knife in my stomach. "I don't know..."

She doesn't press me further, but it doesn't keep my thoughts from spinning.

Luca and Gage.

They're so similar in so many ways-and so, so different at the same time.

Gage and I are not a couple. Not in a committed-to-only-each-other sense, anyway. But I think we could be. The guilt in my chest over Luca's kiss tells me there's more between Gage and me than I ever meant for there to be.

I wanted a summer of escape. Nothing too real. Nothing to make me think too hard about life. I don't think that's possible with Gage.

Luca, though... He's offering exactly what I thought I wanted. A fling. A one-night stand. Nothing serious.

But to have that, I have to give up Gage-and that's just one more thing I don't think will be possible.

Shit.

I want what I feel for Gage to come with the lack of strings that Luca offers.

I want them both.

Oh, wow. What if I could have them both?

I mean, I know I can't, but...

Yum.

Yum times a million.

Get a grip, Cassidy. Jesus.

"Why did Teagan leave?" I force my thoughts away from Gage and Luca. It's too complicated to figure out right now.

"Norris's wife showed up and-"

"Oh, God. The girl he was with was his wife? Why didn't you tell me this sooner?" Panic zips down into my stomach. "Is Teagan okay?"

"She's fine." Vera shakes her head. "I don't think it was a romance thing with Norris and Teagan. She actually left with both of them to get a late dinner."

"Oh." Well, this is interesting. "I bet she'll have so many stories to tell."

"What's her story, anyway? Is she always so mean?"

"No. Well, yes. Kind of." And I spend the rest of our ride telling her about Teagan. Her rough life with her grandparents. The way she's changed over the past few years. It feels good, getting some of this off my chest.

Then we get home and there's a note with my name on the door.

I tried calling but your phone's off. Missed you tonight. Gage.

"What are you going to do?" Vera asks, her eyes wide.

"My phone's not off..." But I grab it from my purse and, yes, it is. It's dead. "Shit."

Vera unlocks the door and I dash into my room, shoving my charger into my phone. "Come on, come on, come on."

The moment I have a single bar of battery I check my voicemail and there's one from Gage. His whiskeyed voice sounds so good, so soothing and so sexy at the same time. "Hey, Cassidy. Hope you had fun with your girls. I stopped by, but I guess you went out after the concert. Give me a call."

And I have two texts from him.

I'm here but you aren't. Should I wait?

Got a weird look from your neighbor. Heading home. See you tomorrow.

He thinks I went out with the girls after the concert. Which, I guess technically is true. I was with Teagan and Vera. For some of it. But still. He was here, waiting for me-while I was letting Luca kiss me. I hate myself.

I don't know what to say to him, but my fingers dial him anyway. I need to hear his voice again. And when he answers, I tell him to text me his address.

"I'll come to you," I say. "I need to see you."

Because it's true. Suddenly, the only thing I need is to be in Gage's arms. Vera asked what I was going to do, and this is it. I'm going to him. Of course I am.

"Should I grab some champagne? You coming to my place? This is a huge step," he teases, and then laughs in his whiskey-honeyed voice.

And I force myself to laugh, too. Otherwise I might cry.

I take a shower, needing to wash away the mistakes of my night, and then I'm on my way.

And maybe, I tell myself on the way over, maybe the silver lining in kissing Luca was that it's pushing me to commit myself more to Gage. He deserves a girl who will be with him, fully.

He deserves a girl who doesn't let anyone else kiss her.

The thought has my stomach tightening all over again.

I blast the radio and sing at the top of my lungs and refuse to let myself think anymore. All the air I use singing helps to calm the swirl of emotions in my gut and by the time I'm pulling into Gage's neighborhood, I think I've got myself under control.

He lives in a house-I don't know why this surprises me, but I guess I assumed he lived in an apartment, too. It's small and white with black shutters. Or maybe they're blue; it's hard to tell in the dim light of streetlamps. I park on the side of the road and make my way along the paved path to his front door. I take a deep breath and knock, lightly because I don't want to wake his roommate. It dawns on me that I don't know anything about his roommate, other than he was nice enough to follow Gage to Vera's apartment that first night when we were so drunk we had to take a cab.

Then Gage opens the door and I don't care about his roommate at all. Not even a little bit. Because Gage. Oh, God. Gage.

His hair is wet, hanging in his face. He's wearing black pajama bottoms and...nothing else. His smooth, toned chest is bare. The expression on his face is a little wicked and very, very hot. My heart picks up its pace. I want to kiss him.

I want to scratch my own face off for having kissed Luca.

"I'm..." I have to clear my throat. "Sorry I missed you."

He shrugs, but it's a little stiff. "You're here now."

"I don't think I could stay away if I tried." A little more truth than I meant to share, but it's out there now-and to see the tension drain from his shoulders at my words, makes sharing them worth it. Until a moment later when guilt becomes a noose around my neck and I struggle to breathe with it.

He moves aside and gestures for me to come in. "Sorry about the mess."

I'm not sure I can take my eyes off of him long enough to notice the state of his house, but as I step through the doorway, everything else comes into focus. And it's perfect, really. Very comfortable; very male. Not messy, just cluttered. Folded laundry on the kitchen table. Pictures in frames crammed on hall tables and the leftover scent of pizza in the air. The telltale box is on his kitchen counter, which is where he leads me, to grab two beers from his fridge. I shake my head at his offer, though, and he puts one back.

He sees me eyeing the box. "Want a slice? It's pepperoni."

I shake my head again. Not sure my stomach can hold anything right now, the way my emotions are spinning. "I like your house." This is what a home feels like, I almost say. "Is your roommate here?"

"He's with his family at the beach for the week."

The thing to do here would be to let my lips curve in a slow, seductive smile and draw attention to the fact that it's just us two, all alone-and that I can think of lots of things I'd like to do with him, alone. And, while it's true, I kind of want to keep looking around. Seeing where he lives, seeing how he lives, unwrapping another layer to who he is-I find I want to discover it all.

I just wish I didn't have to do it all through the shadowed lens of regret. I shouldn't have gone backstage. I shouldn't have let Luca touch me. I shouldn't have done anything I've done all night.

I make my way into his living room, pointing to one of the picture frames on the console table behind his couch. A younger girl smiles back at me, all blue eyed and chestnut haired. She looks a bit like my college roommate, Quinn.

"Is this your sister?" Then I remember his mom married her dad. "Stepsister, I mean?"

He breaks into an easy smile. "Katy. My pain in the ass sister. Yes."

"Pain in the ass, huh?"

"She used me as an excuse to go out with friends all night," he says, pausing to sip his beer. "But neglected to tell me. My step-dad called tonight and I had to scramble to cover for her."

"Ha! I used to do that for..." Jason. I don't say his name, but Gage knows who I'm thinking of and pulls me into his chest, kissing the top of my head. I rest against him for a few moments, soaking in his minty scent, composing myself.

I draw back a few inches to look up in his face. "Anyway. Wanna show me your bedroom?"

There's a pause, like he's contemplating pushing me to talk about my brother, and I hold my breath because I don't want to and I don't know what I'll do if he presses, but then he nods, the look in his eyes sharpening. "Obviously."

His room is a crisp mixture of tans and whites and blacks, and it's neater than the rest of the house. His bed is made, though haphazardly enough to make me wonder if he did it after he knew I was coming over; it's low to the ground on a dark wooden frame and covered with a thick ivory comforter and gray striped pillows. There are framed posters on his walls-some of my favorite bands. And pictures in frames sit along most of his furniture. Mostly of his family. I wonder what they're like. Clearly, he loves them. I have no doubt it's easily reciprocated.

Two guitars hang from a rack on his wall and another one, presumably, is closed in a case leaning in the corner. On top of a small cabinet near the hanging guitars rest a few clean (looking) cloths, guitar polish-which may be the reason there's a faint lemony aroma lingering in the air-extra strings, and a small dish with a smattering of picks. I imagine Gage, holding a guitar, as gently as he does, polishing the body. Buffing the wood with one of those rags, his fingers circling with the perfect pressure I know from experience he can apply.

Picturing him cleaning a guitar should not turn me on.

But it does.

"I looked for you, after your shift," he says.

"I'm sorry I missed you." I can't look at him. I can't breathe. I feel like I need to sit down.

"How was the concert?"

"Okay." I shrug, still not meeting his eyes. I can tell there's more he wants to say, more he wants to ask, but I turn from him and walk around his room instead, trailing a finger along the top of his bookshelves and then dresser and stopping in front of another picture.

"Your mom is beautiful," I say, not having to ask if it's her or not. She looks like Gage, only prettier with high cheekbones and long brown hair. Warm, light brown eyes. The same straight nose. The same sensitive mouth.

"She is," he agrees, then reaches out to spin me toward him. "So are you."

Pleasure sweeps through me.

Desire, too, thickens under my skin.

Guilt laces around me in barbed-wire chains.

"Gage." There are so many words building up inside of me. So many things I want to say to him. That he's beautiful, too. And the way I feel with him... Well, I'm not sure I actually can put it into words. Overwhelmed. Happy. But it's all tainted now. "I..."

He knocks back more of his beer, his eyes never leaving mine, and leaves the bottle on his dresser. "You..."

I can't do this.

I step away, forcing my gaze not to drop from his. "Gage." I grip my stomach. I think I might be sick. But I have to say it. "I kissed someone tonight."

CHAPTER THIRTY.

Gage's expression goes carefully blank-but not before I see the flash of pain across his features, not before I register the shock in his eyes.

"I'm sorry. I didn't meant for it to happen-or...maybe I did..." God. Shut up already. "I don't know what I'm doing. I don't want to-"

His eyes narrow. "You don't want to what?"

A second passes. Then another.

"I don't want to hurt you." It's the truth. I don't want to hurt me, either, but I'm standing here wounding us both.

We stare at each other. A clock hanging on his wall ticks softly, rhythmically, in the space between us.

This is horrible. I shouldn't have told him.

Finally, he points toward his bedroom door. "There's the door if you're looking for a way out."

"You want me to leave?" I don't know why this shocks me, crumbles me. Of course he wants me to leave. I kissed someone else.