I Knew You Were Trouble

Chapter Thirty-Eight

The moment the door to my flat is closed, Aidan lowers his backpack to the floor and pulls me into his embrace. My arms curl upwards underneath his, my fingers splaying out against the muscles of his upper back, my face buried in his neck as he crushes me to his chest. For the longest time we hold onto one another in the shadows, saying nothing.

‘Is that your mother?’ he questions eventually.

I let go of him, turning to see the photograph on my shelf. ‘It is.’

‘She’s beautiful.’

‘She was. And very wise.’

‘Will you tell me about her?’

‘Yes.’

Aidan’s gaze skims around the flat. ‘Nice Oscar.’

‘Thank you.’

He walks over to it, picking up the statuette. ‘Wow, heavy,’ he says before his brows draw together in a frown. ‘Why is there this dent in it?’

My lips twitch. ‘I may have thrown it at the wall… when I was annoyed at being given a job I didn’t want.’

I point to the divet in the wall opposite and he smiles. ‘Well, I’m pretty glad you took that job.’

‘Me too.’

He slides the statuette back on its shelf, comes back to me, and pulls me to him.

‘Wait,’ he says, letting go, and he walks to his bag. He unzips the backpack and pulls out a familiar-looking box.

‘This is yours,’ he says with another smile, taking my bangle from its packaging, discarding the latter and carefully sliding the diamond-encrusted band over my wrist. When the bangle is on, he lifts my fingers, keeping his gaze locked with mine, and presses his lips to the back of my hand. Moving his hands to my waist, he walks me backwards, guiding me towards my sofa. As he sits down, he steers me downward, scooping up my legs to rest on the surface of the sofa, cradling me so that I’m fully curled into his lap, our faces almost touching.

‘Tell me everything,’ he whispers, placing one hand against my cheek, his lips near enough to kiss.

I lay one hand against his chest. ‘After Las Vegas… I fell to pieces,’ I say simply.

Aidan winces, pressing his forehead against mine. ‘I’m so sorry.’

‘Duncan was so worried he called my dad.’

‘Your dad? Are you talking to him?’

‘I am now,’ I say with a smile. ‘I’ve forgiven him. He put me back on my feet again. Looked after me. Got me in a fit state to go to work. He lived with me here over the last few months. Helped me with the documentary. We reconnected.’

‘Lex, that’s incredible.’

‘Well, I have you to thank for it, in a way.’

‘I don’t deserve any thanks for sending you away. For the rest of the tour, I was miserable. I didn’t know where I was half the time.’

‘You were angry, I get that.’

He raises his head a fraction. ‘I was angry at the start,’ he admits. ‘But only for about a month.’

‘I should have told you what I was doing. I should have been honest about that. I was frustrated, when I first met you in Japan.’

He strokes my hair. ‘I didn’t exactly make it easy on you. Ziggy always tells me I’m overprotective. That when it comes to the band, I’m never going to be able to control everything. Plus, we’d had that argument about those stupid photos on my phone—’

‘Yes, but I looked at your phone. Another thing I shouldn’t have done—’

‘I didn’t care about you looking at my phone. I’ll share anything with you, but you were right to call me out on those photos. I should have put a stop to it a lot sooner. I blocked Taylor before that night and deleted her number. I was embarrassed. But then, when Miller came and told me he’d found out about the filming… I just… exploded. I can’t lie about it. And maybe it was a hangover from Lucy recording me all those years ago, but it hurt like hell that it was you. That I was crazy about you made it worse. At first, I thought if I removed you from my life, I’d move on, maybe not immediately, like I was Miller and one of his groupies, and that I’d be over you soon enough and everything would go back to the way it was. But then you were all I thought about. I tried parties, drinking, some drugs; Miller even persuaded me to get a couple of tattoos. Nothing worked. You were there. Everywhere. By the end of the tour in April I’d lost my mind a bit. By then I regretted everything, but I thought I was too late.’

‘Was that when Paige flew out to see you?’

‘She told you?’

I nod, my fingers caressing his cheek. ‘I hadn’t slept for, like, a week,’ he says, shifting his position but still holding onto me, then pushing the hair from his eyes. ‘We’d all had our fill of hotels, of endless photo calls and shows. I wanted to go home. Cal tried to convince me to call you, but I couldn’t see you forgiving me. I thought you would have moved on. I dismissed everything he suggested outright. I got off on torturing myself. We went to New York after that. We recorded some new stuff, shot a new video… but you were still the first thing that I thought about when I got up in the morning.’ He leans forward. ‘I missed you so much,’ he whispers against my mouth, his arms sliding up my back, kissing me deeply.

My tears slide down my cheeks, onto his collar. He breaks the kiss, running his thumb over my lips, pulling me closer still.

‘As soon as I saw the documentary, I knew I’d totally messed up. I hadn’t understood what you’d been trying to do. I didn’t get your vision. We are all stunned. I think we were expecting this one long video of us mucking about. But you gave it meaning. Your work is amazing, Lex.’

I feel a glow spreading out from the centre of my chest. It’s the first time he’s commented on anything I’ve done professionally.

‘Thank you,’ I whisper in response, resting my head against his shoulder as he holds me. ‘Thank you for what you did. For going to California and for standing up to the management company.’

‘Honestly, without you we wouldn’t have even seen it. I think they were surprised to see me put my foot down. Plus, Paige had my phone by then. I would have contacted you days ago. I wanted to come over here and beg your forgiveness, but the guys persuaded me that I needed to do the song.’

‘It’s a beautiful song,’ I murmur, as he helps wipe away more tears. ‘I thought I’d lost you.’

He holds my gaze. ‘I love you, Lex. You didn’t lose me. I can’t imagine myself being with anyone else but you. You’re all that I want.’

‘You’re everything I want too,’ I confess immediately. ‘I never thought I could feel this way. Coming on tour with you… it changed my life. I love you. More than anything, Aidan.’

His kisses are hot and insistent. He whispers his love for me over and over. I shift my position so that I’m straddling him on the sofa, the movement igniting something in me. Suddenly I need to feel all of him. Aidan’s hands go to my waist, still holding my gaze, my fingers in his hair. He raises his hips a fraction, rearranging himself, making me acutely aware of the level of his arousal, sending tingles shooting between my thighs. I tilt my hips forward, delicious friction causing a groan to escape his lips.

‘I need you, Lex,’ he says, his voice husky in the shadows, and he knows when I slide my hands down the contours of his chest that I need him too.

We get to our feet. I take his hand, and I walk backwards towards my bedroom. He follows me willingly.

‘What are you doing tomorrow?’ he asks.

I smile. ‘No plans.’

‘Day after that?’

‘Still no plans.’

‘Good,’ he says. ‘Because I don’t plan on us leaving your bedroom for a very long time.’

I giggle as we walk through the doorway. There’s a single lamp switched on. Aidan takes in the sight of my roughly made bed, the photograph of me with Rebel Heart on the nightstand.

‘Lex,’ he says, pulling me into his arms again, my back pressed into his chest. His hands slide to the hem of my top, dipping underneath it, caressing my stomach. I can feel how hard he is.

Heat floods through me. His lips go to my neck, tasting me. I turn in his arms and our kisses turn wild and desperate, until we’re tearing at one another’s clothes. He’s undoing my buttons and I’m lifting my top. He keeps pulling me in for kisses, our tongues tangling.

Then he stops, shirtless, his suit trousers lying open on his hips. ‘Wait. I can’t mess this up, Lex. Were you hoping for something slow and romantic?’

I stare at him, my breathing shallow. I remove my bra. ‘How about we do slow and romantic after?’

His smile spreads wide. ‘Okay, thank fuck. Give me a second.’

I undress, get on the bed and wait for him. I hear a rustling. He comes back with several condom packets grasped between his fingers. He drops all but one, holding the foil between his teeth as I watch him peel off his suit trousers, until he’s standing naked at the foot of my bed.

I savour the sight of him, making me throb with need. It takes me back to New Year. Only this time, there’s a grin on his face, yet his gaze is ravenous.

Everything is on fire. I swallow. ‘Don’t make me wait.’

He gets onto the bed. He lies down and I settle myself above him, removing the condom packet from his lips, tearing it open and rolling it swiftly down his shaft. I know it’s not the only one we’ll use tonight. In a sign of our palpable desperation for one another, Aidan grasps my hips with purpose and I sink down onto him, groaning as he stretches and fills me, the sounds we make amplified in my small room. For a moment, we are still, basking in the shared sensation of our union, our breaths ragged. Then I rock my hips, grinding against him. I ride him, my breasts bouncing with each movement, under Aidan’s lustful gaze.

His thumb finds my clit. I let out a gasp as he circles it in a perfect rhythm.

‘Oh god, you feel so good,’ I whisper, chasing my climax. ‘Don’t stop.’

‘I love you so much, Lexi,’ he chokes out. ‘So much.’

‘I love you,’ I whisper, the movements of his fingers quickening, slick with my arousal. ‘I missed you so much.’

The ache between my legs is building. I’m moaning with each frenzied circle of my hips, the friction so delicious as he pleasures me, my orgasm building in delicate peaks that fizz out from my centre, where still Aidan’s thumb works its magic.

The intensity of our connection astounds me, the love I feel for him flooding my chest. In this moment, I have no inhibitions. I feel so comfortable with him. I trust him implicitly, especially when we’re like this, naked and writhing, our bodies fused as one.

I never want to give him up.

I don’t care how many fans he has.

Aidan McArthur is mine.

‘Aidan, I… I—’

He alters the angle of his strokes and my orgasm blooms in the most heavenly way possible, spreading upwards like wildfire and tipping me over the edge. My voice morphs into a cry, mouth open, head back, my hips still circling erratically as my channel clenches around him. White spots cloud my vision. Aidan sits up, bringing me down hard against his hips. His body shudders with his release, his jaw clenching as he loses control, spilling every last drop of pleasure inside me. Moments later, our breaths still ragged, he pulls me down to meet his kiss.

‘I love you, Lexi,’ he whispers against my mouth.

‘I love you,’ I say back, clinging to him whilst we drift back to earth, holding onto one another, kissing and stroking, our bodies still joined.

He looks up at me, one side of his mouth curling into a smile. ‘I’ve changed my mind on my favourite sexual position. Watching you like that, it’s—’

I stop his mouth with a kiss, then giggle.

‘I think I need to tell you something, given that we’re agreeing to be completely honest with one another,’ I say.

He grins. ‘Oh god, what? Is it bad?’

‘It involves Ravi, and a certain quiz I had to take back in Seoul.’

Aidan frowns at me playfully, still holding onto me.

‘Your bandmate may have cheated,’ I say. ‘On the final question – the one that decided whether I got to stay – my answer was going to be A, Cowgirl, until Ravi held up two fingers so none of you could see, so I went with B, Reverse Cowgirl, and got the answer right.’

Underneath me, Aidan’s laughing, and it sends blissful vibrations through my core.

I grin. ‘Are you angry?’

‘Quite the opposite, I’ll be buying Rav a beer. Or several.’

This time I laugh, and we’re kissing again.

‘Lex?’

‘Mmm.’

‘Even if you’d got the question wrong, I think I would have found a way to make you stay for the tour.’

I don’t think I’ve ever felt this content. ‘I’m happy that I stayed.’

‘You are the love of my life, Lexi Hart,’ Aidan breathes against my lips, the feel of his kisses making me breathless once more. ‘I am never letting you go again.’