Mase was the one coming out of the bus.

Chapter Three

Mason—the bastard, asshole, prick, dick—that he is, doubled over in laughter when he saw my face turn bright red at the same time I squealed, “I’m so sorry!”

No!

No!

When my Mason-imposter-clone turned around with wide eyes and a gaping mouth, I wanted to fall on the floor and die. Or blame it on Eli. But I couldn’t… because he wasn’t anywhere near me.

“Did you just kick him in the ass?” Mason cackled, holding his stomach with the palms of his hands.

I was mortified, beyond mortified, so far into the realm of mortification I couldn’t see the starting line; so it wasn’t too strange when my face got so hot it rivaled the maximum heating temperature my straightening iron was capable of. I was one of those people who acted like a complete ass when I was nervous. According to Eli and Laila, I acted like a complete ass all of the time, but when I was nervous it reached epic proportions.

“It was an accident!” I told the guy in front of me. I couldn’t look at him directly, not even close. Somehow, at some point, I’d linked my fingers together and covered my forehead with my palms without even noticing it. My eyes went wide as I dragged my hands down the sides of my face until I was cupping my cheeks. “I thought you were Mason” wheezed out of my mouth.

The real Mason only laughed harder from his spot ten feet away.

Out of nowhere, the guy in front of me, whose ass had just become friendly with my foot, laughed. It was a sweet, clear sound.

And it reminded me of the guy who had just finished singing.

No. Please, no. Don’t let it be him.

“It’s fine,” the warm voice chuckled.

Grumbling deep in my chest, at myself more than anything, an awkward smile covered my face as I finally started to shift my gaze, because what the hell else was I supposed to do? “I’m really—”

Tattoos.

All I caught at first was the thick swirl that painted his pectoral, followed by the tattooed bands of black ink that striped the length of his arm. Then there were the tattoos on half of his neck, located on the same side as his full-sleeve tattoo. Hello. Yeah, after the first quick glance I realized his imposter only had one full-sleeve tattoo versus two. Way to go, idiot. My friend didn’t have any tattoos on his chest, but it wasn’t like I’d seen him from the front beforehand anyway.

My eyes strayed back to the hard, flat muscles that packed his chest and checkered abs, and then the narrow hips that flowed seamlessly into the slim-fitting black slacks that had paraded around the stage less than an hour before.

Fuck my life. It was him. The singer for the band.

Whyyyyyy.

“I’m so sorry,” I breathed out, forcing myself to drag my eyes all the way up. If I kept on looking at his bare chest any longer, I’d officially earn my Hussy Merit Badge.

The guy was smirking at me, folding long, muscular arms across his chest. It was right then that I asked myself if I’d died. He was… I don’t think a proper word exists to describe the face above the body I’d been just short of ogling. Mason was a specimen worthy of all the attention he received, but this guy was… just… oof. Just as good looking in a completely different way, mainly because he wasn’t my lifelong friend whose looks I’d become almost desensitized to.

Most importantly though: I had just kicked a hot guy, a stranger, a man I was going to be spending the next three months with, in the ass.

Again I asked myself why. Why. Why hadn’t I just kept my foot to myself? All I wanted was to pull a turtle and hide in my shell.

As much as he looked like Mason from the neck down, their faces were very different. While Mase looked like a model for a cologne line, with his almost androgynous features that had gotten him called a pretty boy hundreds of times in the past, this other guy wasn’t so classic. His bone structure was a little harsher and his eyes deeper set. They both had black hair but it was cut differently. This man’s was shaved down at the sides, the top just a couple inches long, while my childhood friend’s hair was a good length all over. But still, the faint resemblance was there.