Light My Fire (Rock Royalty Book 1) (28 page)

His eyes closed, trying to reject the renewed pain on his skin, in his chest, somewhere deep in his soul. He'd done this to himself, to Cilla, because he couldn't love her back.

Except...

Fuck
.

Except he did.

He pressed his fist to his chest, trying to calm his hammering heart. Shit.

Love.

It swamped him, drowning his breath and making him sway on his feet.

Shit.
Could he do something with the feeling? Actually ask to become a permanent part of her life?

Could he ask her to trust him after his rejection? Could he imagine he'd be given a second chance to breach her castle walls?

Did he even have what it took to make that play?

It takes courage to create your own identity, to stop believing old stories about who you are or that limit who you can be.

Could he do it?

And another voice sounded in his head, one that came from some place deep within.
Go for it, Ren.
It sounded, oddly, a little like Gwen.

I dare you.

"What's up, bro?" a voice asked from the darkness.

Ren jolted, then recognized his half-brother in the shadows. "Shit, Payne. You're quiet as a ghost."

"I've always thought at least one is lurking about here," he said.

Pushing away the unsettling idea, Ren gave his brother a speculative glance. He'd perform a favor without questions asked, wouldn't he? Ren could send him for his bag and meet the other man at his car, avoiding awkward goodbyes and further emotional turmoil. Then, in hours, stretched out on his airline seat-turned-bed, with the low roar of the jet engine in his ears, he could turn back time and restart his old, solitary life once he hit the ground in London.

"Payne—"

"So what's up with our Rapunzel?" he said, lifting his chin to indicate Cilla who could still be seen at the window, her facial expression and body language telegraphing her unhappiness.

"I'm in love with her," Ren blurted.
Fuck me
.

Even in the darkness, he could see Payne's eyes widen. "Uh...yeah?"

Ren inhaled a long breath. "Yeah."

"What are you going to do about it?"

"Nothing, right?" He forked his fingers through his hair. "It was you who pointed out I don't know anything about a normal relationship."

"That might work in your favor in this case," Payne said. "As another Lemon kid, Cilla doesn't know anything about one either, so you can probably get away with fucking it up a little at first."

"I don't want to fuck it up at all," Ren ground out. "I want to..."

"What?"

Do it right. Make her happy. Let her make
me
happy
. But what would convince her to give him that chance?

"I should forget all about this," Ren muttered. "About her."

"Or you could give it your best effort," Payne said, and then his mouth curved and his teeth glowed white in the darkness. "I dare you."

The second iteration of that phrase seemed to hang in the air.
I dare you
. He'd never been able to resist it, and he wouldn't do it this time, because at the words a plan instantly formed.

He might not have a whole hell of a lot of hope it would win Cilla over...but he'd always been a cocky badass and so he had to give it a try.

And just like that, he went from the idea of an attempt to a commitment to winning.

To winning what he'd always lacked and what he'd always, he realized now, needed.

Cilla had gone through the motions. She'd had to, as the party had been her idea. But once the guests were digging into the food and drinks, she'd escaped to her childhood refuge. The tower room wasn't spacious and now was barely furnished (if you could call a single free-standing mirror barely furnished) but it gave her distance from what was going on at the other end of the compound.

Ren making his goodbyes and then making his way out of Laurel Canyon.

She'd whispered to Cami to come get her when he was gone and the other woman had given her a sympathetic glance, then nodded.

You little fool
.

Staring out over the compound, more of Ren's words replayed in her mind.

After the way we were raised, I never imagined you could somehow tangle up emotions and sex. The fucking Lemons should have been good for teaching how little one relies upon the other.

She wanted to be angry with him over that. Instead, she just felt tired and sad and in her chest she was aware of a new presence. Her heart had been returned to her.

Broken.

Her spirit felt that way too. She'd thought Tad Kersley's actions had stomped on her confidence, but Ren's rejection of her love had done something different. He hadn't messed with her sense of self (funny, falling in love, reciprocated or not, had demonstrated being rock royalty did not mean she was emotionally stunted as she'd always thought, which was a good thing), but realizing she'd lost her other half made her more lonely than ever.

She glanced down at the new tattoo, as tender as she felt inside.

Maybe she'd love again, she thought, trying to cheer herself up. Now that she knew she could, it was something to strive toward.

A strange scraping sound caused her to frown. Narrowing her gaze, she stared out the window again, trying to determine the source of the noise. When it wasn't immediately apparent, she pressed her hips against the window sill and leaned out the opening.

Nothing.

Then movement below caught her eye. Not below on the ground, but below on the
wall
.

Her breath caught in her throat and she bent farther at the waist. "Ren! What are you doing?"

Not that she couldn't tell. Not that she couldn't see, in the wash of light directed against the outside of the Castle, that Renford Colson was climbing the rough-hewn bricks. He glanced up at her, his toes wedged in a deep crevice, his fingers gripping another. "Climbing up to you, Rapunzel."

She gaped at him, her heart beating like mad. "You're crazy. Get down. Get down at once!"

He was panting a little. "Safer moving up, baby. Though I'm sure you wouldn't be too unhappy if I land on my head."

"Stop being ridiculous. You broke your arm doing this once."

"Cheated this time," he said, on the move again. "Payne and I dragged out an extension ladder. Got me up a good twenty feet."

Cilla rolled her eyes, even as her heart continued its accelerated rhythm. "Oh, well, then."

It took hours (in real time, possibly minutes) before he was at the window. Cilla moved back as the top of his head reached the sill. Then he was staring at her, his fingers grasping the bottom of the window, his feet presumably braced on something stable.

The fairy lights didn't soften the angles of his cheekbones and jaw, but there was a gentleness in his gaze that made her belly tighten.

She licked her lips. "What are you doing?"

"Coming for my Rapunzel," he said.

Her fingers gripped each other at her waist. "I don't understand."

"I remember Gwen reading you the story."

"A fairy tale."

"Yeah." He studied her face as if looking for something important there.

"The prince falls, you know." She took another step back. "In some versions, the witch pushes him to the thorns below."

His brows rose. "Is that what you want to do to me? I wouldn't blame you."

She shook her head, because she couldn't trust her voice. All she wanted was for this to be over. But he continued staring at her so she had to say something, anything, to get him on his way before the tears that were hot behind her eyes spilled onto her cheeks.

"It's okay, Ren. I get maybe you're feeling bad for what happened between us, but it's okay.
I'm
okay." Or she would be, she told herself. Some day when she found a way to forget about him.

"He goes blind," Ren said.

Cilla blinked. "What?"

"The prince. Rapunzel's prince. I remember the story too. After he falls or is pushed, he's blinded by the thorns and only regains his sight when he rediscovers the beautiful woman he loves."

"Okay." What was this all about? "Now that you've proven your grasp of—"

"But that's not the way it went for us."

Cilla didn't know how much longer she could hold back the tears. "Ren, you should go. Climb over the window sill, go down the stairs, go back to London."

He did part of that, hoisting himself up with his arms (she cursed herself for noticing the power of those muscles) so one long leg and then the other could step onto the floor. She took a few more paces back, until her shoulder blades met one corner of the small room.

Ren stalked closer, then stopped a few feet from her. His long hair was disheveled, there was tension in his jaw, and a strange light in his gaze.

Her belly clenched again and she felt that inexorable, sexual pull. His charisma calling to something inside of her. Trying to ignore it, she closed her eyes.

"I was blind before I fell in love with you," Ren said, his voice low. "Not after."

Her eyes popped open. He'd come another step closer and now his hand reached out and his palm cupped her cheek. She flinched at the delicious goodness of it and he frowned.

"Have I hurt you that much?" he asked.

"I don't know what's going on," Cilla whispered.

His thumb stroked her face, spreading dampness so she knew a tear had escaped after all. "I couldn't see myself loving anyone. Being with anyone. Having a future that was filled with love and family."

"Ren—"

"Then you showed me how it could be. You showed me how sweet are the ties that I thought would never be for me. You made me want them. Fiercely."

This was a dream. She'd fallen asleep in the tower room and this was wish fulfillment. Still, Cilla couldn't help herself from placing her palm over the hand on her face. "You feel real," she told him.

His smile curved his wonderful lips. "I am real, baby. This is real. What I feel for you is real."

No. "You told me you'd never forgive me."

"Because I'm an ass. Because at that moment you'd made me want something I was afraid I could never have."

"See? You don't want my love."

His free hand tucked her hair behind her ear. "You're the first person to offer it to me in a long time...maybe ever. I didn't know what to do with it."

She rolled her eyes. "Plenty of women have been willing to offer you love, Ren. I'm pretty sure of that."

"Maybe." He leaned down, touching his forehead to hers. "But there has been only one woman who made me want to offer it back. My love, my heart, my life. Everything."

The words weren't making sense. "Everything?"

"All I've got, baby."

Fear suddenly cooled her blood and slowed her heartbeat to a funeral knell. Once they'd gone, nobody had ever come back for her and she didn't think she could trust any of this. Trust Ren. "No," she said, shaking her head and trying to slide away from his touch. "This will hurt too much if it doesn't go right. You should leave. I should leave."

Ren's hands moved to cup her shoulders. "Neither of us is going anywhere. At least not without each other."

"It won't work." She looked up at him, desperate. "How could it possibly work?"

"Because I'll make it work," Ren said, his gaze confident, his touch gentle. "That's what I do. I fix things. I make them come out right."

Another tear rolled down her cheek. "Are you trying to tell me you can create happy endings?"

He smiled down at her. "For you and me, guaranteed."

Her years of loneliness still resisted the promise. "Ren..."

Looking about the room, one of his hands slid down to grasp hers. Then he pulled her toward the opposite corner, in front of the freestanding mirror. Their images were reflected in the glass. Ren, dark-haired, and muscled. Cilla, looking wide-eyed and unsure of herself.

"What do you see?" he whispered, his mouth against her temple, stirring her hair.

The most beautiful man she'd ever imagined. "I don't know."

"Look lower, baby." His fingers squeezed hers.

Her gaze traveled down and snagged on their tattoos. With their hands entwined, the dark designs kissed at the bottom and then again, forming a perfect heart. "They match up," she whispered.

"Like we do," Ren said. "Two halves of a whole."

Cilla's resistance melted. Her walls fell. The last of her self-protection conquered by the certainty in her lover's voice.

She turned to him. "You love me," she said.

"God, so much."

"You love me," she said again, thrilling at the words.

"Forever," he promised.

Then he sealed the vow by drawing her close for a heated, claiming kiss.

As they pressed together, heart-to-heart, guitar notes floated through the compound. Ren's head lifted and Cilla stared into his eyes that were filled with passion and tenderness. The song Cami was playing (it had to be Cami) seemed to twine around them. Cilla knew it instantly. It was steeped in Laurel Canyon lore, about a house not far from them.

It had been written in the early years of the Canyon's musical history, before the Velvet Lemons had arrived and long before their nine collected children had come on the scene to live their odd and often solitary childhoods.

Maybe that was changing, Cilla thought.

She believed, finally, that her life had.

Her palm cupped Ren's beloved face, so long in her dreams and now the star of her future.

"You see how it's going to be for us?" he asked, his voice husky, his gaze searching her face. "How it's going to be beautiful?"

"Yes," she whispered. In the distance, Cami played the chorus of the song and Cilla whispered to Ren, paraphrasing the lyrics. "Everything will be easy 'cause of you."

The End

Dear Reader:

Ren and Cilla captured my heart and I hoped they touched yours too! Light My Fire is the first installment in the Rock Royalty series and there's more to come. A visit to the beautiful and infamous Laurel Canyon in Los Angeles planted the seed for the stories that will follow the lives and loves of the Velvet Lemon kids. Each one will have the sunny sexiness you expect in a Christie Ridgway book...along with those tender moments of souls beginning to believe in happy-ever-afters. As always, I do my best to make you smile—and maybe tear up just a little too.