A Lush Rhapsody: A Rhapsody Novel (15 page)

“I don’t even know them anymore, short stack. They’re like that teacher you had in third grade—you remember her like she was in a dream you had once. If you saw her tomorrow you might do a double take before you’d realize who she is.”

But these people weren’t his third grade teacher, they are the people who gave birth to him, fed him, clothed him, took care of his every need for nearly two decades. I think about my own parents, how little they understand me, how they’ve allowed my brothers to treat me like a second-class citizen my entire life. I think about the way they take me for granted, the way they stopped coming to my performances after elementary school.

But then I remember that they also paid for my music lessons, braided my hair every morning, and decorated my room entirely in purple when I asked for it at the age of ten. I think about my mom taking care of me when I was sick as a child, and my dad teaching me to drive when I was a teenager. For all their faults, I think they love me—at least as much as they’re capable of it. They simply don’t respect or understand me. What do you do with that?

“I could live without ever seeing my brothers again,” I tell him honestly, “but I don’t think I could cut out my parents.”

He breathes deeply, his nose in my hair. He does that sometimes, like he’s taking a hit of me. I wonder if he misses the cocaine all the time or only sometimes.

“Some people aren’t worth the heartache. My parents are some of those people.” He pulls me closer and leans his head down to kiss me on the nose. “Now, are you going to go to sleep or do I have to fuck you again to wear you out?”

I snort laugh, my face buried in his chest. He smells like coffee and sandlewood, and his skin is hot beneath mine. I love sleeping next to him, he’s like my own personal furnace.

Before I know what’s happened he’s flipped me underneath him and his talented guitarist fingers are working their way down my stomach toward the juncture of my thighs.

He rubs all that scruff against my neck and I shriek and wiggle trying to get away.

“You’re insatiable,” he growls. “Always wanting more. It’s exhausting, short stack. More, more, more. That’s all I ever hear.”

I’m laughing harder now because he’s grabbed my wrists and pinned them above my head while his other hand is pinching my side right where he knows I’m most ticklish. He keeps rubbing those whiskers against my neck too, and I’m writhing like a beached fish.

Then his hand moves to my core and he runs a finger through the slick heat there. We both fall motionless, breathing hard. His voice goes soft, dark, dangerous. “I swear to God if I could choose how to die it would be inside of you.”

My heart lurches, straining to break free of the confines of its prison. I moan softly.

He kisses along my chest, reaching my nipple and drawing it into his mouth, laving it with his tongue, making my back arch and my mind go hazy.

“I want to be bare in you, short stack,” he whispers.

I freeze, pulse racing, breath caught in my throat. I get the birth control shot because I don’t ever want to have to worry about that kind of a mistake, but I’ve also only ever gone without a condom with one guy, my high school boyfriend. We dated for over a year and were in love—at least as much in love as you can be at eighteen.

“It’s okay,” he quickly fills the awkward silence. “I shouldn’t have asked.”

“No, wait,” I say, tamping down my inhibitions. “I’m just…Are we…I guess I didn’t know you wanted anything more than a good time?”

I hate that I sound so unsure of myself, of the whole thing. God, I’m not that girl, why am I acting like it now?

“Well, maybe we can have a good time only with each other?” His lips press to mine once, twice. “We’ve got four more weeks of the tour. No reason why we shouldn’t take advantage of it.”

My pulse slows. Now I understand. We have an expiration date. It makes perfect sense.

“Since we both had to get a clean bill of health for the tour insurance, seems like we might as well make use of it. You’re on the pill or something, right?”

He moves and his cock slides against my clit.

“Yeah,” I answer, my voice breathy. “The birth control’s covered.”

“So, we have a deal? You, me, nobody else, and a month of great fucking?”

I notice there’s no mention of love or more than the month. But really what’s the point of even thinking about those things? We can’t ever be together in a real way. He’s Rhapsody. I’m Lush. Even if they didn’t hate him, being part of Lush is an all-consuming job. We’ll be putting out the first album since I joined, then there will be the tour to launch it—the last thing I need right now is a fledgling relationship to nurture. But a month of this, with Blaze? I could do that, and I know for a fact I’d enjoy it. Probably too much. But I brush that thought off. I’ll just make sure not to get attached. I can handle it.

“I think that’ll work,” I tell him, staring into his blue eyes and getting those little shards of pain in my chest that I do whenever I watch him.

He exhales like the weight of the world just left him. “You just made my month—literally. The things I’m going to do to you.” He skims his lips across my cheek then nips at my earlobe.

“Less talk, more action,” I pant out as I wiggle my hips. He complies by thrusting into me, and then we both stop moving, frozen in a place of such amazing ecstasy all we can do is gasp.

“Oh, yeah,” I grit out.

“Fuuuck,” he gasps.

“I can see why you suggested this.”

“Oh, baby, I had no idea. This…” He crushes his lips to mine, licking along the seam of my mouth. I open to him and he devours me for a moment then lifts his head again. “This is beyond even my wildest dreams.”

He starts to move and we both groan because it’s the most incredible sensation I’ve ever had. Bare was not like this with my high school boyfriend. This is so slick, so hot. The ache runs all the way from my core up to the center of my chest.

He pumps in and out of me in smooth, even strokes, sending the headboard of the bed banging against the wall each time. “Tell me…you’re close,” he grunts. “’Cause I’m not going to make it long, baby. This is…too much.”

I shift, bringing my knees up under his arms to change the angle. It works like a charm and in moments the world’s most incredible orgasm is ripping through me, blinding me to anything but the explosion that’s tearing me apart then putting me back together one piece at a time.

Blaze feels me let go and raises up, his biceps bulging as he holds himself stiff armed above me and roars out his release.

I’m still breathing hard as he collapses on me, nearly knocking the wind right out of me.

“Holy hell,” he gasps.

I choke out a little laugh. “Yeah, right?”

“I’m sorry, I’m going to crush you,” he says as he rolls slightly to the side, pulling out of me at the same time.

That’s when I’m reminded of the messy part of no condoms.

“Ugh,” I say, “who’s going to sleep in the wet spot?”

He rolls, moving me on top of him. I giggle then look down at him. He’s suddenly serious as he brushes a strand of hair out of my face. “I’m happy to endure it for the chance to do that with you again.”

I smile. “You’re the best, guitar hero.”

Chuckling he deposits me on his opposite side. “Yeah, I know.” Rolling onto his side to face me he cups my cheek. “You make me better, Tully.”

I swallow. The way he shifts from silly to serious and back again so quickly makes me dizzy. Or maybe it’s just looking at him that makes me dizzy. He’s the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen.

“I haven’t liked myself in a long time. But I do like who I am with you, short stack.” He closes his eyes and kisses me on the forehead. “I like us,” he murmurs before his breathing lengthens. Within moments he’s asleep and I’m left alone in the dark, wondering how there can be an “us” with enemy bands and an expiration date. And do I want it to expire at all?

W
hen I was
a freshman in high school my dad’s longtime business partner, Drew North, passed away suddenly—stroked out in the middle of a company golf tournament. I remember that my dad was torn up over it. He and Drew had started the company together, after getting their MBAs, and Drew had been the CFO and my dad’s right-hand man.

When Drew died, his part of the company went to his wife, meaning that she had a seat on the board and the second-largest share after my dad. About two months after Drew’s death, I started hearing my dad talk about Drew’s wife opposing him on something at a board meeting. I overheard multiple phone calls between him and other board members.

He had an extensive list of complaints—she was too emotional, too risk aversive, she didn’t understand the federal regulations the insurance industry operated under. My mom stopped having her weekly lunches with Drew’s widow, and we didn’t go to church with them on Christmas Eve like we had every other year of my entire life.

Then one night a few weeks after New Year’s I woke up to voices from outside. I went to my window which was directly above the front of the house. When I looked down I saw Mrs. North standing on our front walk, and my dad facing her in his bathrobe.

I quietly opened my window to hear them.

“Drew is rolling over in his grave, Peter,” she said, her voice pitched high and desperate. “You can’t be serious about this.”

“I’m sorry that this is difficult for you, but Drew knew better than anyone how brutal this business can be. We have to do what’s best for the company. It’s nothing personal.”

There was a quick sharp sob, like a dagger plunged into the darkness, before she was able to regain control.

“You will rot in hell for this. Remember that. When you’re sitting in your million-dollar office, remember that Drew’s children are being forced to leave their school, that his baby daughter will be spending forty hours a week in daycare while I go to work, and his mother will have to give up her home health care aide and move to a low income apartment. I always knew you were ruthless, Peter. I had no idea you were soulless as well.”

My dad murmured something else to her, but she was already heading down the sidewalk, her gait jerky, shoulders stiff.

I waited until the next day after football practice to ask my mother what had happened. She didn’t look me in the eye when she said that there had been some decisions made in the best interests of the company that meant Mrs. North’s shares were devalued, and almost all of Drew’s assets had been in those shares.

A few days later the headmaster at my school stopped me in the hall. “You need to give your father my congratulations,” he said.

“Why?” I asked.

“That deal he swung with RomanCorp. Looks like your dad’s doubled the size of his company overnight.”

It would take another six months before I learned the whole truth, which was that my father struck a deal with RomanCorp to conduct a backdoor takeover. My dad retained his chairmanship and he and most other board members were given very valuable RomanCorp stock as part of the deal, but existing shares in his company became worthless, leaving Drew North’s widow virtually penniless. The last time I heard about her she was working as a marketing assistant at a local mall, and her kids were attending a public school down the block from the two-bedroom apartment they lived in.

It was one of many lessons my dad taught me about what it takes to come out on top in every single situation in life. And sometimes you have to hurt people, even people you care about. Sometimes you have to leave people behind, even people who’ve been good to you and trusted you. No one ever said it was easy to be the winner.

As the buses roll out on the road to Sacramento I think back to some of the business deals I watched my dad make over the years. There was always a winner and a loser, and I never once saw my old man lose. Making him lose is the thing that keeps me moving along day after day. He thinks that I lost because I gave up football, but I’m going to show him that he was wrong about me, about music, about all of it. I’m going to make sure
he
loses for the first time in his life. And really it’s only right that I be the one to finally beat the old bastard. In fact, I might be the only one who
can
beat him. I’m the one who was raised by him, I know him better than anyone else in the world. If anyone’s going to beat him at his own game it’ll be me.

As the rest of the guys are either plugged in to video games or sleeping, I take out my laptop and fire it up. I log in to the wifi for the bus and then open my email.

To: [email protected]

From: [email protected]

I’m hearing rumors about Joss Jamison and Tammy Clark, Walsh’s wife. Something that happened several years ago. I’ll see what I can find. Also I’m looking into Mike’s mother’s suicide again. There might be something there that’s been missed.

I read it through twice, and my stomach feels out of sorts, and my left eye is twitching. But I repeat the words in my head that ground me—every day, every decision, every deal.

My phone dings on the table next to my computer and I look at the message that flashes on the screen.

Tully: I was sitting here thinking about that one thing you did last night before we fell asleep.

I can’t help the secret smile that curves my lips. I know exactly which thing she’s thinking about.

Blaze: You liked that, did you?

Tully: Me screaming your name that way didn’t give you a clue?

I chuckle as I remember her hoarse cries as she rode me reverse cowgirl.

Blaze: I have more surprises for you, short stack. I promise you’ll like them.

Tully: I can’t wait. The schedule says I’m on a different floor than the rest of the guys tonight. Want to come to my room?

Blaze: Yeah. Text me your number and I’ll be there after we get checked in.

Tully: K. See you later.

Blaze: You bet you will.

Her room number flashes on my phone a few minutes later and I watch it glow until it times out and the screen locks. My eyes travel back to the open laptop in front of me. I can feel it, how close we’re getting to finding that one thing that will put Lush out of the running for the Super Bowl. That one piece of them that they don’t want anyone to know, that will tarnish them so badly that a national institution will turn its back on them. When I have it, I’ll use it. But it doesn’t mean I’ll like it. If there were another way I’d use it, but they’re too good at what they do—Lush is too loved and too respected for me to take the risk. In order for Rhapsody to win, Lush has to lose.

It’s not easy being a winner. I only hope when all this is over Tully will understand that.

* * *

I
t’s
after midnight when I finally get settled in the hotel and can take the stairway down to Tully’s floor. We’ve become pretty adept at sneaking around hotels. It was fun the first few days, but I have to admit, after having her to myself with no worries of discovery at my place in Malibu this isn’t sitting so well with me. I want to be able to see her, talk to her, touch her whenever I please. She’s hardly some dirty little secret I need to keep in a back room somewhere, and I have to admit that I worry about the guys who don’t know she’s with me. The groupies—because yeah, there are male groupies too—the guys in the other bands on our tour. I sort of want to put a big flashing sign on her that says,
Property of Blaze Davis, Touch at Your Own Risk.

But I know that I need to stop those kinds of thoughts. This is a short-term deal. No matter how much I like her, no matter how hot the sex is, no matter how many times a day I find myself dreaming about her, this has no future and we need to keep it all undercover. Because the last thing I want is to ruin her new job for a month-long fuckfest.

I reach her floor and peer through the small window in the door to exit the stairwell. The hallway beyond looks empty, so I open the door and take a few steps out. I’m at the end of a short hallway and as I stride forward around the corner I realize too late that there’s a man walking toward me—and it’s Colin Douglas. My heart races almost as fast as my mind as I scramble to think of how to handle this.

By the time I reach him Colin has stopped in front of a door with his fist raised to knock. I glance at the door number—it’s Tully’s. Fuck. I take a deep breath and keep moving, thinking I’ll toss out a “hey man” and move along like I’ve got business at the other end of the hall.

Colin stops before he knocks and looks at me, his head turning to follow as I come alongside him.

I tip my chin at him. “How’s it going?” I grunt.

He returns the gesture. “It’s all good,” he answers. I keep moving and I hear him knock on Tully’s door.

Unfortunately I also hear the door open and Tully’s voice. “I thought you’d never—Oh! Hey, Colin.”

I don’t know what goes on after that because I turn the corner into the hall that houses the elevator. I jiggle the change in my pocket as I wait impatiently for the damn metal box to show up and take me out of this fucking mess. When it finally comes I lean back against the wall and take a deep breath. Jesus. If this were just about me I’d have no problem with the deception, but adding Tully in the mix has me off of my game. I care about what happens to her, about her job and her reputation. I could never forgive myself if I fucked this up for her. The pressure is intense.

Before I’ve even reached my own floor again my phone dings with a text. I’m expecting Tully, but I get a number with no name instead.

503-555-1212:
I don’t know what’s going on, but if I find out you fucked with her there will be nowhere you can hide.

I stare at the screen, my heart racing a mile a minute. The elevator doors open and I stride to my room quickly. When I get there I open my email and pull up the roster of band members’ phone numbers. My finger is unsteady as I slide it down the list on the screen looking for the D’s. When I reach
Douglas, Colin
, my eyes dart between the text on my phone and his number in the list. It’s a match. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

My phone dings twice more, this time with texts from Tully. Dammit. What the hell do I tell her? Sorry, babe, I think I just outed us to your band?

Tully: Hey. Where are you? Colin stopped by earlier and I thought he was you, but I covered saying I was expecting room service so I think it’s all good.

Tully: Also, I have a whole bottle of massage oil here. I’m hoping you can show me how to use it. ;)

My gut flip flops. God. She’s so beautiful. She’s tough and sweet all at the same time, innocent and completely fucking sexy. Smart and talented. And she deserves so much better than me. So much better than a guy who she has to hide with in dark corners and back rooms.

I sit in the silence and the near darkness of my hotel suite for moments that turn to minutes and then more than an hour. Finally a siren outside in the night jars me from my stupor. I pick up my phone and slowly tap out a response to Tully.

Blaze: Sorry. Something came up. Have a nice night.

I hit send and lean my head back against the sofa, my body drained of any initiative for anything. Inside of me the war is ongoing—I want Tully, but I can’t have her. And it feels like it might tear me in half.