Page 43 of Collide

“I’ll protect her,” Petty says with his typical flirtatious charm. He doesn’t mean the innuendo implied in his voice. He’ll welcome Ivy with an open heart as my girl.

“But you want her for yourself, don’t you?” Jared asks, and I shift my eyes to him.

“Yes,” I state without hesitation. Am I missing something? Does Jared like Ivy as well? “Why? Do you want her?”

“No, but I don’t want you to hurt her.” His tone pisses me off although I appreciate his concern for her.

“And how would loving her hurt her?”

“It won’t,” Petty interjects, turning his head and narrowing his gaze on Jared. They’ve obviously talked about this as well. We were a foursome of friends, but pairs as far as closeness. Cash and me. Jared and Petty. However, I know my friend well enough to surmise the logical side of Jared wants to question me. How could I love her in only a week’s time? The romantic songwriter in him wants to believe love can happen in an instant.

“She just seemed upset,” Jared defends.

I pause, defeat weighing on my shoulders. “She’s scared, Jared. That’s all. Her mom. Cash. The baby. It’s too much.” I stare at him, willing him to understand as I do. She’s had too much happen too fast.

Jared combs his fingers through the longer hair on top of his head. “I’m sorry, man.” He looks away a second. “She just said it was time to go home. She was rubbing her stomach, and I thought it was the baby.”

Tommy comes around the counter. “Did she say something was wrong?” His voice fills with the concern a father would have for his child, and I’m reminded this is how he feels about her. She isn’t his, yet he’s raised her as if she were.

“That’s it,” I say to him. “You understand, right, Tommy? You practically raised Ivy like she was your daughter, but she’s not… You can’t fault me. I’m going to love her baby as if she were mine…blood or not. That baby needs a father, and I want to be it.”

Tommy glares at me. “What do you know about fatherhood?”

“What did you know about it before Ivy? She isn’t even yours, and that’s the point. It doesn’t have to be that you fathered her; you’re essentially her dad.” Tommy blinks, crossing his arms more casually than his normal bouncer stance. “I want to be that for Ivy. I want her and the baby.”

My voice strains at her loss, feeling as if the world is against me.

“You’re going to be a rock star, Gage,” Tommy tells me.

“And it didn’t stop you from doing everything for Ivy, either.” I don’t have to know their whole history to know that Tommy Carrigan put his blood family before everything else.

“I want to love her. You can’t fault me there.”

Tommy turns his head away, crossing his arms over his broad chest. “We’ll have to agree to disagree.”

How can you disagree with love? I don’t ask. I need to make things right with the band first.

I turn to Jared. “I’m sorry about last night. I got caught up in the excitement, but I won’t do that again. We’re family. Us.” I point at the three of us. “I miss him, too, man, and we’ll get it back, but not if we’re divided among who’s left,” I warn him. We won’t stick if we pull shit like this, helping girls escape and breaking each other’s hearts. Petty bumps Jared’s leg with his knee and nods his head at his friend.

“I’m sorry,” Jared mouths.

I exhale before I drop the next bomb on them. “I want to marry her.”

The room goes quiet.

“What?” Jared hisses. “Don’t you think it’s kind of fast?”

With a slam of a coffee mug on the counter, Tommy exits the room.

“I met her two years ago,” I remind him. “I’ve been circling her for years, and thanks to Petty, I missed my chance last summer.” We’ve already tackled how he got in the way of my reuniting with Ivy sooner.

“I told you maybe it wasn’t supposed to happen.” Surprisingly, Petty’s tone remains sober. He did tell me this when we talked about what happened. He told me maybe it wasn’t my time, but she needs me now.

“I get that,” I say to Petty, “but I don’t believe it any longer.”

“It’s going to change everything,” Jared blurts.

“Everything already is changed.” Jared and I stare at one another a moment until he swipes a hand through his hair and looks away from me. “But it doesn’t have to change between us.” I don’t need to clarify those of us who remain. “I’ll never give you guys up. Never.” The emphasis is important. We were all at loose ends when Cash brought us together, and I refuse to let us unravel just because he’s gone. He abandoned us, not the other way around. I won’t let Jared or Petty go unless they walk away, and even then, I’m pretty certain I’d chase them.