“No! Mackenna, do you realize what you’re saying?!”

“I’m telling you the truth.”

“I need to talk to my mother,” I suddenly say, my chest close to imploding from the pain delving into our past is causing. “I need to talk to my mother.” I run to the corner and hold my hand up for a cab while Mackenna calls after me.

“What the fuck are you doing?”

When a cab screeches to a halt, I climb inside and close the door, my world spinning. “Drive! Now.”

The car screeches past him as he flings his arms up in the air, and I think I see him mouth, “What the fuck?” but I can’t be sure.

I’m close to unraveling, and I tell myself that I will. That when I’m back home, I’ll have a good long cry, even if it takes me months or years to heal. But I can’t break now. Not when I still need to know the truth.

My mother has her faults. She’s bitter, true. She’s overprotective, but . . .

I can’t fathom she would do this to us.

Break us apart.

Exploit her power.

Make me experience the same pain of betrayal she felt after the truth about my father’s affair came out.

An indeterminate amount of time later, I find myself at Lionel’s open door. I don’t even react to Olivia, visible right on the bed behind him. “It’s off. The contract. It’s over. I’ll give you the money back.”

“What . . . ?” He glances back at Olivia, twists the lock so the door doesn’t close on him, and steps out wearing just a hotel bathrobe. “What the fuck did he do?”

A wave of protectiveness washes over me. “It’s not Mackenna. It’s me, all right? So whatever deal you had with him . . . please, just honor it. I just need to go home now. You got some footage. Ask Noah, he caught us kissing in the plane. And fooling around in the car. He caught us . . . looking at each other too, I’m sure. And when we were locked in the closet, he probably caught the sounds of us kissing too. But please”—I’m begging him and I don’t even care—“I can’t be here anymore. I had an out from the contract saying if I didn’t fulfill, every cent would be turned back. It will be. I’m out. I quit.”

“You can’t quit!”

This last comes from the low, angry, painfully familiar voice of Mackenna. I spin around and there he is, eyes glimmering with anger, ready in his battle stance. But he looks . . . confused. Like he doesn’t know what’s happening here. One minute we’re mashing songs, the next I’m running. But can he blame me for running, when he ran too? All I know is that I need to be home. I need to stop this from spiraling. I need to talk to my mother.

“I need to go home,” I tell him in the strongest voice I can manage, searching for even an ounce of pity in his face.

“Miss Stone,” Leo says, but Kenna stops him.

“If that’s what she wants, I’ll fly home with her.”

“Really?” I ask, wide-eyed.

“Yeah. Really.”

An intense wave of relief and gratitude washes over me. And love. A painful, intense, overwhelming love that makes me wrap my arms around myself as my entire body trembles. “Thank you.”

“Argh! Fuck this!” Leo explodes. “Jones, if you take her home, our deal is off. Do you hear me!” he yells as Mackenna heads to his room in the opposite direction from mine.

When he answers, Mackenna’s voice is unwavering. “So be it.”

NINETEEN

LET GO

Mackenna

“If you think I’m letting you ruin whatever deal you have with Leo, you’re wrong, Mackenna. I’m flying out of here, and I’m doing it alone.”

“Says who?” I contest, crossing my arms with a frown as I watch her pack. She’s got her suitcase up on the bed, and boy, is that lady on a mission to pack, and pack quickly.

“Says me!” she cries, then stops to look up at me with the same eyes that kill me in my dreams, every single night. “Please. If you’re worried—don’t be. I’ll be fine.”

“Yeah, but I won’t.”

She laughs and looks up from her suitcase as I approach. Now she’s blushing, and I like it. “Kenna.”

“I’m serious, I won’t. Be fine.”

Because truth be told, while she’s packing, I’m panicking. For real. I don’t want her to go, and I sure as fuck am not inclined to let her fly without me.

“Promise me you’ll stay here,” she says, clutching some sort of undergarment in her fist as she shoots me a warning glare. “You have a concert and I have . . . to go. Promise.”

I take the undergarment from her hand and fling it aside, squeezing both her hands in mine. “Pandora, I’m not letting her stop me from being with you again,” I tell her gruffly.

“Mackenna, this has to be a misunderstanding . . .” She trails off, then she’s up on her toes, taking my mouth, hard, leaving me winded. A hungry kiss. Like she’s fucking desperate for more.

When she turns to keep packing, I stop her and force her to face me, because all this? It’s eating me up. “She may deny it. Are you going to believe her over me?”

“She won’t deny it,” she whispers, dropping her gaze to my throat. “If it’s true.”

I drop my hands and a low, bitter laugh leaves me. Not lie about it? Yeah, right. That woman has been hell-bent on keeping us apart for years. It’s always been me. Never good enough for her—and even then, like the masochist pussy I am, I still fucking wanted her. “It is true. I won’t let her break us up, Pink,” I angrily warn.

“We’re not breaking up, we weren’t even back together!” she counters.

“Then let’s,” I insist.

“What?” she gasps.

“You heard me. Let’s officially get back together.”

I dig out my mother’s ring from the pocket of my jeans. I don’t care she threw it back at my feet. The fact that she’d kept it all these years tells me what she won’t tell me in words.

I saw her watching Brooke and Remington. I know she longs for that—craves it even—and I want to give it to her. Hell, I’ve been itching to get free of the crazy band hours, the fans, the paps, the cameras too. I want no one but this girl, but if I’m not good enough now, then fuck me, I’ll never be good enough for her.

“We can’t get back together,” she whisper-gasps, then plucks at some imaginary lint on her black T-shirt. “It’s not as if we can change anything, or pretend that we didn’t . . . fuck up.”

“True.” I reach around her and lower her suitcase lid so she stops packing for a hot sec and focuses on me. “But see, I don’t want to talk about the past right now, Pink. I want to talk about the future.”

She’s holding her breath.

“New York concert is in five days, right?” I press.

“Right.”

“So go home. Do what you need to do. But come back to me.” She stares at the ring I’m holding up, and I stare into those confused, dark coffee eyes. I’ve done this before, except six years ago, she was excited to see this ring.

Is this a promise ring?

What are you promising me?

Me.

But now she looks trapped. Sad. Lost. The tensing of her jaw indicates some deep frustration. My voice roughens with emotion because I don’t want her to be lost, I want her to feel certain, of me. I want her to find whatever she’s looking for, in me.

“I want you to come back, Pink,” I whisper, my voice husky as I hold her startled eyes with my own. “Not because they’re paying you to, but because you want to.”

“Kenna, what are you doing?”

He tips my head back. “In my life, there have been three times when I’ve had to make important choices.”

She can’t breathe.

And neither can I.

It’s been a long time since I’ve opened up like this to anyone. In fact, I can only remember opening up to one person like this in my life—and that person is standing right in front of me.

“The first time was when I left you. The second was when I joined the band. And the third,” I stare deeply at her, “the third one is right here, right now.”

“Kenna, this isn’t your choice. Me going home is my choice.”

“You’re right, but then I also have a choice here. You see, I choose”—I emphasize the word—“not to live without you anymore.”

She stares at me with those eyes that make my head spin, biting her lower lip in the way that makes my teeth ache.

There’s pain in her eyes.

Hell, I feel pain inside me.

But I can feel, deep in my gut, that she feels for me the same way I do for her. She’s just fighting it harder.

“I can’t do it so easily. I won’t leave my cousin, my friends, my life. I can’t! You don’t mean this.” She’s shaking her head frantically as if I’ve just proposed death instead of just the idea of being with me.

“You won’t have to leave your cousin, baby . . . I’m leaving the band.”

“What?” She’s stunned now—her suitcase, her packing forgotten as her mouth gapes wide. “But the band is a part of you.”