“You’re going to get us into trouble, Dixie Leigh.”
I shiver when his head drops onto my shoulder and his teeth graze my neck. “I think maybe I like trouble,” I whisper. “A lot.”
It feels like home in his arms, safe and warm, protected from the judging eyes of an unfamiliar audience and Mandy’s painfully honest observations. The deep cadence from Gavin’s rumble of low laughter tickles me behind the ear and I squirm. Turning my head when a metal door clangs shut I see that we’re no longer alone.
Straightening myself upright immediately, I watch Gavin take a necessary but excruciating step backward. Dallas’s horrified anger is obvious enough to be a tangible thing even from five feet away. His fists are clenched at his sides when he stalks over to us. The sickening fear that those fists might be about to slam into his best friend’s face sends my body into panic mode.
“What in the ever-loving fuck is going on out here?”
I barely hear him over the pounding of my heart. An inferno of fiery rage flares in his face and heats my skin with the shame of being caught like this.
“Nothing,” I answer quickly, ignoring Gavin’s entreating gaze. “I wasn’t feeling well. I got sick and was upset about . . . about what I heard Mandy tell you. Gavin was comforting me.”
Dallas’s rage is somewhat diluted by guilt. His eyes soften, cooling a few degrees when they land on me. “Dix, she didn’t mean that. I talked to her, explained. She—”
“She said I was holding you back, Dallas. Maybe she’s right.” I shrug, despite the soul-stinging pain of knowing she might be.
“What happened to her getting us, D? I thought she liked our sound. Dixie is damn sure a part of that sound.” Gavin’s stance has changed and now he has clenched fists, too.
I realize that I just inadvertently revealed that Mandy was the one who’d upset me a second too late.
“It’s more complicated than that. Dixie only heard part of the conversation.” Dallas shoots a fleeting look of sympathy at me before turning a hardened glare on Gavin. “Speaking of complicated, in the future, if my little sister is upset, you tell her to come talk to me. And from now on, you comfort her from arm’s fucking length.”
“I don’t take orders—not even from you, Dallas. And right now, I’m not real happy about the way you let your new friend run her mouth about your little sister. And for the record, she’s not anybody’s little anything and she’s standing right here so how about not talking about her like she isn’t.”
My brother squares his shoulders and steps right into Gavin’s personal space without apology. “You got something to say to me, Garrison? Because I thought we’d already talked about this. I thought I was pretty clear the first time, but maybe you need clarification.”
Gavin gives my brother a smirk that morphs seamlessly into a sneer. “Don’t bow up on me, D. You know how I feel about that shit. Or maybe you’re the one who needs a reminder.”
Oh God. I’m not sure what they’re referring to specifically—half of what they’ve said makes absolutely no sense to me—but my female intuition is on high alert. This is about to go so wrong so fast. I’m practically being forced backward by the surge of testosterone flowing violently between them. I can’t be sure if I’m holding Dallas or the band back musically, but causing fights between him and Gavin will definitely send all three of us crashing down in blazing flames of failure.