Page 3 of Rock the Chardonnay

“I’ll drive you home. It’s too late to ride your bike.” I lean against the counter, mostly so I don’t fall into the hot butter and burn myself. “Unless Ciaran is going to drive you.”

She snorts and leaps off her stool, holding her plate and soda can. “If my mom could save more than ten dollars at a time, I’d buy a car and save everyone the trouble.” She puts her dishes in the sink and the can in the recycling. She turns to me, leaning her elbows back on the counter. The posture pushes her excellent breasts into a more prominent position, and I studiously keep my gaze on the pancakes.

Two of which sit in little circles right next to each other, looking remarkably like breasts.

I tug at the collar of my St. Olaf High Mathletes tee. “It’s no trouble to drive you.” My pancakes are burning. I flip them and settle them onto a plate. “I’d rather do that than worry about you.”

I turn to get a fork from the drawer beside her, and this is a colossal mistake. Her gaze is on me, her eyes soft, her lips pulling into a gentle smile. The utensil drawer is a minefield. I don’t need a fork. I can eat pancakes with my hands.

Before I can save myself, Daughtry circles one of her petite hands around my wrist. The bracelet of her touch burns and nearly makes me collapse like a skeleton-less sack. My gaze, tortured traitor that it is, trails from her hand up to her face and arrests there. She is the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.

“You’re a really nice guy, aren’t you, Declan?” Her voice is a sultry promise.

My breath stutters in my chest. “That sounds like a kiss of death.”

She leans a centimeter closer to me. She smells like maple syrup and my brother’s soap and it’s all very confusing. My cock doesn’t know how to make heads or tails of it, but it follows thousands of years of genetic code and rises to the occasion. “You could look at it as a kiss of hope. Some girls do want nice guys, Declan.” I love the way she says my name, like it’s music.

Still. I know the truth. She is Ciaran’s girlfriend.

I step away from her and set the pancakes on the island by the stove. Distance would be helpful in this situation. “What does Ciaran think about you moving to New York?”

Daughtry scoffs. “You and I both know he won’t give a shit. He’s great, really. But it won’t last, and I’m cool with that.”

My only two girlfriends so far have both been of the long-term monogamous variety. I’m not built for the casual hook up. But how could Ciaran ever let Daughtry get away? If she were mine…but she isn’t.

“You are?” I ask. “Cool with that?”

She shrugs. “If I’m going to be a songwriter, I need a lot of different experiences to pull from. I need to write about life, and there’s no way to do that unless I live it. These feet are not designed to stay put. And besides, no one wants songs about the person they settled for in high school.” Her gaze flicks up and down my body, and not for the first time, I wish I were wearing something other than study sweats. “Don’t you think?”

The whole kitchen feels charged, filled with crackling energy, protons and electrons flittering around at warp speeds. The air is sweet with the scent of pancakes and rich fried butter and sugary maple syrup. Through it all, there is Daughtry, pulling me to her like she always does.

What if this once I took a chance? Not to kiss her or have sex or anything, but to share time with her? Get to know her? The instant slips through my fingers like water through a sieve.

But I want it to last. I step toward her. “Daughtry—”

“Hey, are those pancakes?” My asshole brother stomps into the room, sweeps up the plate of pancakes I had made, then bends and kisses Daughtry full on the lips. He is shirtless and wearing a pair of boxer shorts that my mom should have made him throw away, since they are at least two sizes too small. I imagine he didn’t because he likes how tight they are. “Ooh, these ones look like boobs. Don’t they, babe?” He tilts his plate for Daughtry to look. She glances down briefly then back up toward me.

“Yeah. Sure, Ciaran,” she says.

Kicking myself, I turn off the stove and take a bottle of water back to my study table. That’s all over. I had one chance to tell her how I felt, and I blew it.

“I’ll drive you home in two minutes, babe,” Ciaran says. I hear him kiss Daughtry again, sloppy and loud. Like a douche.

I bend my head back to my banana ester model.

I blew my one chance and I will never get another one.

CHAPTER 2

Daughtry—Now

I never thought I’d be here again.

Of all the places my mom and I had lived growing up, I always liked St. Olaf the most. Which is why I never intended to return. Life is in the front windshield, not the rear view mirror.

“Daughtry, we have to prepare your statements for the interview.” My agent, Louise Fields, scrolls down her tablet screen. “It’s the local paper, but still. They want to talk about when you lived here, what it’s like to be back, blah blah. What do you want to say about Wisconsin and your time here?”

Outside the car, familiar fields and trees fly by. A warm sense of nostalgia curls in my stomach. “It’s so green.” Los Angeles is the place I’ve lived the longest over the last decade, but it’s brown grass and sprawling buildings for eight months out of the year. Here it’s lush and rich, the air thicker. I like it. It feels…real.