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“One sec.” He pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and pecked those words into the notes app on his cell phone. He wasn’t sure if he’d stumbled across lyrics to a new song or if it was a flash of an idea that wouldn’t pan out. Either way, he couldn’t risk losing it.
“Did you suddenly have a burst of inspiration?”
He considered the sweet, beautiful redhead across from him and thought, hell yeah I’m inspired. “Hit me out of nowhere but I couldn’t ignore it.”
The same could be said of her.
“‘Lightning,’” he answered belatedly, and this time, honestly. “‘Lightning’ is my favorite Cash Sutherland song. I wrote it and rewrote it for years. I agonized over every word and practiced it until my fingers bled. I can sing it in my sleep. I can perform it and call up the way it felt to put those words to music for the first time. It’s part of me, that song—that’s the truth. Indelible. Inseparable. Undeniable.”
Her features softened. The facade of cunning and eager journalist fell away, leaving just Presley. As if his honesty pierced the armor she hadn’t known she’d worn.
“Pure,” she said. “Your love for that song. That must be why it resonates. Why whenever you perform it, it’s like you’re singing a memory.”
She didn’t know it, but she had him dead to rights. He was singing a memory all right. A memory of a certain red-haired, blue-eyed and, yes, pure girl he’d been halfway head over heels for.
Presley Cole. The one who got away.
Or, more accurately, the one he’d left behind.
He couldn’t let her go home to the Sunshine State without them finally sharing the one thing they hadn’t. He couldn’t live with another decade of regret. While he believed the lyrics of “Lightning,” which said it never struck twice, he would accept a few distant flashes in its place.
A night or two with Presley in his arms would give him an idea of what he’d missed out on years ago, satisfying the hollow ache that had resided in the center of his chest since. And maybe, her walking away from him this time would heal the hurt from what he’d done to her. Win, win.
She was bold, smart. Driven. She could hold her own anywhere, and with anyone. He desperately wanted to find out if that would be true in his bedroom.
Throughout dinner she continued quizzing him. About his music and the new album. What it was like to work with his brothers closely. If there was any competition between them for Biggest Alpha Male—her words. That question made him laugh out loud. No, they hadn’t competed. They were each in their own corner of this crazy industry and content to share the spotlight.
Halfway through dinner, his guard dropped, which was less about the wine and more because of the company. Presley was still easy to talk to. The word genuine bounced around his head again, a few disjointed chords and notes bouncing with it. He wouldn’t dare take his attention from her to write them down.
“How’d Will deal with the duet between you and Hannah Banks?” Presley swallowed the end of her wine and set the glass aside. “You and his wife-to-be essentially sang a love song to each other. Did it make him jealous?”
“No.” Again, Cash laughed. “Hannah and Will are inseparable. He had nothing to worry about, and he knew it. As wonderful as she is, she’s not my type.”
“Famous and beautiful isn’t your type?” She tapped her chin in faux consideration. “Your exes Heather and Carla might disagree.”
“What about my ex-girlfriend from college?” he asked, his voice low. “Would she disagree?”
“I’m neither of those things.”
“You are a famous journalist—”
“Hardly.”
“—and the most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid eyes on.”
Her delicate throat moved as she swallowed. She might not believe him, but he was telling the truth. As beautiful as the women he’d been photographed with were, none of them were Presley.
“Cash Sutherland,” she scolded, her tone playful, “are you trying to seduce me?”
“Yeah,” he answered. “I am.” That wiped the smile off her face. “And if you want to end this night in my bed, your arms and legs wrapped around me, a light sheen of sweat coating our bodies after we’ve wrung each other out in the best way imaginable, I suggest you let me.”
