They weren’t on the same page, Tarin decided. He and Lee were talking about two things at the same time, or two things in different ways. Was weird good? Was bad good?

Lee was biting her lip again, worrying about something he had said. Tarin couldn’t look away, but then Lee was frowning and saying that weird was good because things weren’t bad and that little crease he’d seen the other day had appeared between her brows.

Tarin had held back the other night, but today in the middle of a semi-crowded bar he reached up and hesitated for just a moment before gently smoothing that crease away with his thumb and brushing a stray strand of hair back from Lee’s face and behind her ear.

”Then why are you frowning?” he asked softly, leaning just a little bit closer so she could hear.

As she looked up into those green eyes, Lee didn’t think that she could look away even if she had wanted to right now. When had her heart started beating so hard?

Suddenly, Lee felt something cold touch her knee and realized that she was still holding her beer bottle. Without taking her eyes away from Tarin’s, Lee set the bottle on the bar.

And at the same time, Lee saw Tarin’s hand in front of her face, felt his thumb trying to rub away the crease between her brows, and her breath caught in her throat. Then he tucked a bit of hair behind her ear and she shivered.

”Then why are you frowning?”

“Because it sounded like you thought this was bad,” she said, her voice also soft as she leaned her head into his hand slightly.

“Because it sounded like you thought this was bad,”

God no…”” Tarin breathed, thumb brushing slowly back and forth across Lee’s cheek. He could hardly breathe, his heart was in his throat and it was pounding.

”Never bad. I thought… he said, closing his eyes and shaking his head for a moment, ”It doesn’t matter what I thought…”

They were close now, the distance between them having seemingly shrunk to nothing. Tarin’s hand slid down, coming to rest just under Lee’s chin to tip her face up just a little bit more…

“Uh. Lee…you’re up.”

God dammit Matt.

Lee smiled as she heard Tarin’s answer, shivering as she felt his thumb moving on her cheek.

“Good…” Lee replied. When had they gotten so close to each other? Not that they had been far apart before, but Lee knew they hadn’t been this close to start with. As she looked up into Tarin’s eyes, she realized that it wouldn’t take much more. Lean in…stretch up a bit to reach him…

She could barely breathe as she licked her lips nervously. Though Tarin must have had a similar idea because his hand had slipped to her chin, gently lifting her face that extra bit…

“Uh. Lee…you’re up.”

Lee blinked, blushing, when Matt’s words brought her back to reality. And the fact that they were indeed standing at the bar in a room full of people.

Lee let out a shaky breath as she reached for her beer to take a good sip. Only then did she turn to look at Matt, pretty sure that the blush was still on her face. “I’ll be right up,” she told him before setting the beer back on the bar.

“Uh huh,” Matt said, clearly not convinced based on what he’d walked over to. But he did walk away.

And she still hadn’t decided what she was going to sing. But she bent down slightly to grab her guitar case before she looked up at Tarin again. “And that is what I used to do at the bar,” she told him with a sheepish little smile. Then grabbed his hand with her free one and gave it a little squeeze. “Don’t go anywhere?” With that, Lee stepped away from the bar, hoping and wishing that the blush would be off her face by the time she made it to the stage.

Tarin took back every single nice thing he’d thought about Matt. Lee moved away and Tarin’s hands were actually shaking as he watched her grab her beer and take a drink.

Surely there was time…he half reached for her, then let his hands drop as Lee spoke.

That…that had been what she used to do at the bar? The almost kissing? Actual kissing.

Then Lee was squeezing Tarin’s hand and stepping away from the bar.

”Wild horses couldn’t drag me away…” he said, the phrase from his childhood popping out unbidden.

Sighing deeply and running a hand through his hair as Lee disappeared, Tarin turned to get another beer to find one already waiting.

Picking it up and taking a drink, Tarin decided maybe he didn’t dislike Matt so much after all.

As Lee made her way up to the stage, she focused on trying to get her breathing, and her heart rate, back to normal. She hadn’t been all that eager to play tonight, but after what had just happened with Tarin there…

Lee took another slow, deep breath as she felt her stomach do a little flip just thinking about it.

And they hadn’t even kissed.

Get it together Lee, she thought to herself as she got to the side of the stage. Setting her guitar case down on the stage, Lee pulled her guitar out then climbed the stairs onto the stage as she put the strap over her shoulder.

Stepping up to the mic, Lee took a deep breath as she looked across the bar, giving Tarin a small smile when she saw him. Then she looked down at her guitar for a moment before starting to play, words joining the song just moments later.

“Don't mistake the silences
There's so much I haven't said
It's not that quiet in my head
But I can't even tell you that…”

---

As the song finished, Lee’s eyes opened again since she’d ended up closing them not long into the song, losing herself in the music. Though, not quite as much as she had lost herself in Tarin’s eyes just before that.

Turning, Lee made her way off stage, only pausing long enough to return her guitar to the case before walking back to the bar. And Tarin.

The second Tarin’s eyes found Lee again, they never left. Onto the stage they followed her, watching every movement as she pulled out the guitar and got everything ready. They were still watching when she smiled at him and it hit him like a punch in the gut. God, they’d been so close, and she was so gorgeous up there under the stage lights.

But then, Lee started to play and Tarin forgot to think about any of that. Lee started to sing and he kind of forgot to breathe, only remembering when his chest started to burn.

She was good. No, she was great. What did it matter if he knew next to nothing about music?

The song was far too short, but also way too long because Lee had said that she’d be back when she was done.

It was silly, and considering the fact that he hadn’t known her all that long in the grand scheme of things it was probably kind of weird…but God was he proud of Lee for getting up and singing like that.

She was done now and was approaching him all over again and suddenly Tarin felt sheepish and more than a little awkward. ”I didn’t think you could get any better…” he said simply when she was within ear shot, ”But that was amazing. I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but Rachel was absolutely right.”

As she came up beside Tarin again, to the spot she had left just a few minutes earlier, Lee set the guitar case down. And blushed as she heard Tarin speak. “That I couldn’t get any better?” she questioned, a happy but slightly embarrassed smile joining the blush on her face.

But then she realized what else he had said, and Lee looked at Tarin slightly confused. “Wait, what did Rachel say?”

Because Lee ws sure that Rachel had said quite a few things when she was planning this whole thing. But Lee wasn’t sure what her sister would have said that Tarin would be agreeing to right now.

“Though,” Lee continued after a couple of moments, biting her lip as she blushed a bit again. “If I wasn’t worried about completely forgetting where we are again, I would say we should continue from where we were interrupted…”

Tarin had to shake his head and chuckle just a little bit, ”You don’t have any idea, do you?” he said.

It made sense that she didn’t. Lee was so worried about taking care of everyone and everything else, so dead set on assuring everyone she was nothing special.. It was definitely possible that she didn’t have any idea just how incredible she was.

Tarin was going to change that, he decided. As for Rachel.

”She just knew you needed to do this.” he said, nothing more specific to share this time.

”I’m glad I let her bully me into it.” both because of the singing and the other developments the night had so far revealed.

Lee spoke again, and Tarin took a slow, deep breath before he looked down at Lee, eyes very, very warm, ”If I wasn’t worried about the same thing, I’d completely agree with you.” he said, ”But you’re going to have to stop biting your lip like that.” he added, staring straight ahead and not at Lee as he took another drink of his beer.

Tarin Brooks prided himself on his self control, but he was only human.

”You don’t have any idea, do you?”

Hearing Tarin, both the words that he used and the tone of his voice, Lee couldn't help but blush. Though, what Tarin said didn't really answer her questions about what Rachel had said that she had needed to just get out.

“Well, I'm not sure I get her reason, but I'm glad she was right about it as well,” smiling up at Tarin.

And despite the fact that the night had resulted in (mostly) unexpected results, or maybe because of that, Lee was very glad as well.

He was worried about completely forgetting where they were again. And he wasn't even looking at her. Lee couldn't help but blush a bit darker. “Then maybe…” Lee said consciously making sure that her teeth released her bottom lip and left it free. “Maybe we should finish these beers and head home?”

”Yep.” Tarin said, wishing for a moment that the second beer hadn’t ever appeared and glancing down at Lee for just the briefest of moments. ”Yeah…let’s do that.” he said, wondering just how quickly he could drink the beer as he took another drink. Then another.

Probably pretty quickly.

But Rachel was back at the apartment. So was Kevin. Tarin found himself considering whether or not he could bodily remove Rachel from the apartment before she opened her mouth and whether Kevin could be counted on to stay hiding in his room. At least for a little bit…

God he was a terrible person. A horrible…terrible person. It was so hot in this bar, he thought reaching up to undo a button on his shirt that was suddenly suffocating.

But. He looked over and down at Lee again.

He really needed to finish that beer.

Lee grinned when Tarin agreed that it would be good to finish their beers and head home. That definitely sounded like a good idea, and for more reasons than Matt not being able to tell Rachel about the two of them ending up making out in the middle of the bar.

So Lee took a long sip of her beer before glancing up at Tarin. And seeing him undo a button on his shirt. And, though it didn’t let her really get any more of a view of his torso, it definitely made her think back a couple of nights to when she’d been in his room after Robert left. When Tarin hadn’t been wearing a shirt. Lee’s breathing caught in her throat and she needed to swallow the lump suddenly in her throat before she could take another sip of beer.

Her eyes finally made it the rest of the way up to Tarin’s face as he was taking a sip of beer. His was still over half full?

“You know what?” she asked as she set her still quarter filled beer back on the bar. “We still have beer at home. Do you want to just go?”

The god damned beer was multiplying. Tarin would have sworn it as he realized it was still a little over half full and he could feel Lee looking at him. He didn’t look back at her, if he did, they weren’t going to make it out of the bar. Jesus, were his hands shaking?

Tarin took a deep breath and concentrated for a few moments on just pulling his damn self together. He was not a 15 year old boy on his first date and he could act like a reasonable human being.

Lee spoke, and he set his beer down with a decisive clink.

”More than you could possibly imagine. I’ll get the tab, you grab a cab?”

Tarin wasn’t even looking at her as he took a sip of his beer. And he looked tense. But the moment she suggested they just leave then, his bottle was on the bar and she smiled. “Sounds like a great plan,” Lee said as she grabbed her guitar case. “I’ll meet you out there.”

As she made her way to the door, Lee took a deep breath. How in the world was she going to get Rachel out of the apartment? That…That was not going to be fun. Or quick.

Well, if all else failed, Lee could take the opportunity to show Rachel how strong she was.

By this point, Lee was out of the bar and on the sidewalk. Looking around, she saw a cab coming down the street and hailed it.

Lee left, and the further away she got, the easier it got to breathe, to think. Tarin deeply regretted not bringing cash, but it didn’t take him long to catch Matt’s eye.

The bartender approached and Tarin found himself getting a more assessing look than he would have expected from the man on the other side of the counter.

“I’ve known Lee for a long time.” Matt said as Tarin handed him his card. Matt took it, but stood there for a moment turning it in his hands.

”So she’s said...” Tarin said, frowning slightly and wondering where this was going.

“I hope you realize just how lucky you are.” Matt said and Tarin found himself surprised and just a little impressed at how fast the playful, over the top demeanor had changed.

”I’m more than aware.” Tarin said, and Matt nodded, running the tab and handling Tarin the little slip to sign along with his card.

“This is the first time I’ve seen her out in years, and from what Rachel says, you haven’t been around very long. I don’t mean to put too fine a point on it, but she’s had enough heartache to last a lifetime..”

The statement hung in the air there, but the message was loud and clear. ”I’m glad she has so many people who care about her.” Tarin said, ”I’m not playing any games.”

“Good. Then hopefully I won’t have to have Tony break your legs.”

Tarin just nodded. It didn’t seem like a joke, he thought as he put his wallet back into his pocket and headed for the door. It didn’t go unnoticed on second pass just how large Tony was, and Tarin walked up to Lee right as a cab materialized.

Tarin couldn’t help but think as they climbed inside about what Matt had said, what he had implied, and what it all meant as the cab pulled out into traffic. Tarin was almost painfully aware of Lee in the seat beside him and he desperately wanted to reach out and touch her in any way, but instead firmly grasped his knees with slightly white knuckled hands.

What was happening between them felt inevitable at this point, but…was it the right thing to do?

One thing was certain, the cab ride to the apartment felt much longer than the cab ride to the bar had felt.