URGENT (Book 2 of the Soundcrush Series)

Chapter 10: (Even) Nice Guys Lose Their $hit Sometimes

Check out the theme song for Mac and Adam's Fight ...Way Down We Go by Kaleo.

Adam

I'm glad the hotel door slamming open woke me, because being slapped in the face with a pair of jeans is not my favorite way to wake up.

"Get up. Sexy times are over." Mac follows up with a wadded shirt. 

Then she's a blur of motion, throwing clothes into her suitcase at the same time she's trying to streak on some mascara and lipgloss and toss her counterful of makeup into her travel case. I ignore her abruptness and check my phone. Did we oversleep? She gets easily stressed by the itineraries. She hates to look unprofessional.

No, it's early. We don't have to leave for the airport for several hours.

I rise, watching her body language as she glares at herself in the mirror, plastering on black eyeliner.

Yeaaaaahhhh.

 I'm going to need my pants for this.

Fuck, maybe some coffee, too. 

I slide into my jeans and lumber into the kitchenette of the suite. I pop a pod in the Keurig while Mac throws shit around in the bathroom. I almost make her a coffee, but hesitate. She's already amped up, and frankly, I'm a little grumpy with her. Damn, she can be a moody piece of work. We went to bed in a better place than we've been in years. What the hell happened?

I sip my coffee. She probably had a dream that upset her. Or maybe another one of those prickly intuitions. I sigh. I know the whole condom-breaking thing is really freaking her out. She's trying so hard to ignore it, but the clock is ticking on the morning after pill. She's probably just stressed.

I relent and make her a coffee.

Decaf.

I take the coffee to her in the bathroom, where she's putting her hair up in one of those messy bun things. It looks cute when she does that, because the whole backside of her hair is a soft palette of pastel highlights—tangerine, sea green, aqua. She looks like a little striped Easter Egg.

The idea of Mac as an egg that could easily crack makes me frown into my coffee. She acts so tough, but in truth she's so very fragile. Especially since the trauma last year. Nobody else—not even Leed—really understands that, but I do.

She mistakes my frown in the mirror. "What?" she snaps.

"Nothing." I say.

She looks down at the coffee. "Jesus, Adam, who wants to drink that shit? There's a Starbucks in the lobby."

"You are not too good for a K-cup, Shortcake."

She shoots me a bird as she zips up her bag and brushes past. "You really need to get the hell out of here,  Adam. People are up, roaming the halls."

Ahhh...that's what happened. She stepped out and probably saw Leed in the hall. I follow her, catching her from behind, with a gentle squeeze on her shoulder. "Hey, what's wrong? Talk to me."

"Nothing is wrong except you are doing the shit you always do. I let you sleep in my bed a couple of nights and you act like we are a couple or something. This doesn't mean what you think it means. It means...nothing. This was just...to get each other out of our systems early in the tour, and now I really want you to leave."

I'm angered by the coldness in her voice, and I'm about to call bullshit when a knock on the suite door interrupts us.

Mac freezes. "Shit. I forgot." She rushes to the door and tries to keep it closed, speaking through a crack to the other side.