Backstage Pass: Last Call (The Backstage Pass Rock Star Romance Book 6) (2 page)

I lifted up on my tiptoes and kissed Jesse, then stepped back so he could toss his bags in the trunk. He closed the trunk and leaned against the fender, then slid his arms around me and jammed his hands in my back pockets. “You sure you’re up to this? I can tell the contractor to finish it after I get off tour, but I thought you’d like to pick out colors and help finish the inside.”

I kissed his chin. “I’m way more interested in the yard.”

“You want me to tell him to just paint it all white and put in some random beige carpet?”

I sighed and laid my cheek
against his chest. “Does it matter to you?”

“Not one bit. All I care is that
you’re here, in it.”

I
tipped my face up, leaving my chin on his chest. Maybe this was a moment for me to redeem my earlier botch. “Are you asking me to move in?”

His face softened and he brushed my hair behind my ear. “Maybe, but only if that’s not moving too fast.”

Considering that I’d already kind of made myself at home and had hoped that was the plan now that I was back here and couldn’t exactly move in with Kerri, it was nice to have him ask—even if it was a maybe. And I wanted him to know that I really was all in and he couldn’t scare me off by moving too fast, though I sure made it look that way a lot of the time.

“I definitely want to live with you.
But I sure wish that meant we were actually in the same building for more than a night.”

He sighed. “I know, baby. But we’re going to make this run hard for right now. Once we get the audience built up then we can slow down a little and get back into the studio, which puts me at home a lot more.”

“I’d like that.”

“So
, will you fix me up a home to come home to?” A slight smile played on his face and I could almost believe that he wasn’t bummed about the engagement. Moving in together—or, at least, our version of it—was a good step in the right direction.

“I would love to.”

He kissed me and drew me tight against his body. I was still sore from our sexathon and would’ve totally done him in the driveway, but he lifted his head and gave me a dazed love-drunk look. “I have to go.”

I moved against him. “Are you sure?”

He nipped my neck, then set me away from him. “Yes.”

I crossed my arms over my stomach. “I’m going to miss you.”

He opened the door and stood there, staring at me. “Every moment, baby. Every single one.”

I bounced up on my toes and tried to focus on how happy I was to see him, not how bummed I was that he was leaving. We’d figure this out. We always did. I took a step back and glanced over my shoulder at the house. “Where do I start?”

“The general has your number, I say wander through it today and figure out if there’s anything you want not white, otherwise, have at the yard.”

I suddenly realized we hadn’t talked about money or how I was going to pay for any of this. I hadn’t even thought about getting a job with all the drama of the last several months, bu
t now that I wasn’t in school, Mom wasn’t going to be keen on me being a freeloader. I shuffled my feet. “So, um . . .” God, how do I put this so I don’t sound like a total gold digger?

“All the bills are going to Ainsley and she’s setting me up with a manager, so everything should be taken care of. Do you need other money?”

My cheeks were on fire and I was so embarrassed. I’d never needed to ask for money before. Mom kept me on a pretty tight budget, but there was always money in my account and I’d rarely had to ask for any. “Um . . .”

He walked over and cradled my face between his hands. “Sasha, you’re directly responsible for my success. My money is your money, baby. It’s ours. All my accounts have your name listed, you just have to go to the bank and sign the signature cards.” He shook his head. “I’m so sorry that I never told you that. I didn’t even think about it because I’m never thinking about money when we’re together.”

I blinked and wrapped my fingers around his wrists. “Are you sure? I mean, I don’t know if that’s a great idea. We’re not even . . .” Pain clouded his eyes and I couldn’t believe I’d nearly jumbled that up again. We could at least be engaged if I hadn’t effed that up.

He smiled and kissed me softly. “We are in here, baby.” His hand fell from my neck and landed in the center of his chest.
“We are in here.”

I wanted to melt and beg him to
propose again, but I also wanted to give it some real thought while he wasn’t standing here gifting me things. I put my hand over his chest and the other over my heart. He covered my other hand and his eyes fell closed. After a long inhale, he leaned forward and rested his forehead against mine. “You going to be okay?”

I nodded. “Yes, but come home soon.”

“Deal.”

He peeled us apart and got in the car. I stood there long after the tail lights had disappeared in the overgrown disaster of a driveway, then I went to find gloves and pruning
sheers.

I wiped my brow and stretched, pushing my hands into the small of my back. Good thing I’d gone through a bunch of PT to get to this point. Drake would be happy with what I’d accomplished today. A whole lot of work and no whining. I glanced down the driveway. It finally looked like perhaps it led somewhere instead of some scary overgrown path to a haunted house. I peeled off my gloves, crusted and brown from the layer of dirt and grime from all my weeding. I had an idea of what I wanted to do to the yard, but I wanted to take a minute and sketch it out, then lay some lines. I’d rummaged through the garage and had found the gloves, a rusted set of pliers that I’d turned into pruning sheers and a can of blue marking paint. Before I went to the garden center, I wanted to at least have an idea of what I had in store for me to turn this yard into an oasis for both of us. The more I’d worked on the driveway, the more I’d realized that I wanted to transform this into someplace where Jesse could come get away from everything.

Even though the property line had been the scene of our serious incident, only good had actually happened in the yard and in the house. This would come to be the place where he’d proposed, and our new home. I jogged up the back steps of the deck and grabbed my water jug and took it inside, kicking off my shoes by the door. The first thing I wanted to install was an outdoor shower, or at least a place to rinse off our dirty hands and feet, especially if we were getting
beige carpet and white walls. My footsteps echoed the whole way to the kitchen, and even though I wasn’t very good with interiors, I could almost start to see the layout of the cabinets and the shapes of the furniture.

Kerri had always been the one who’d seemed to make magic out of nothing when it had come to our furniture. In ever cared much about the inside of my house, and it seemed like every time she was over, she’d rearranged it. I’d call her on the way to the garden center to see what she thought about helping me do the
interior. I was sure she had plenty of stuff going on with getting her and Axel’s house ready and I still wanted to see that too. I missed her.

I eased on the
makeshift faucet in the kitchen, turning my face away as the water came out rusted and the pipes clanked. Hopefully the contractors hadn’t crossed that off their punch list yet. I’d need to start making a list of those types of things that they had to do. I had no idea how to remodel a house, but I wasn’t opposed to the challenge. Especially with nothing else going on.

I rinsed the dirt down the drain and scrubbed a little at my fingernails, but there wasn’t much point since they were going to look like that for the next couple of weeks.
I made a mental list in my mind adding paper towels, some soap, and drinking water. I’d need to hit the grocery store too, and maybe I should figure out a fridge first. There were so many moving parts to this and it was very much the chicken or the egg. Did I need to figure out the layout of the kitchen before I picked out my fridge? Or did I need to do it the other way around? Those all seemed like really great questions for Kerri.

I jogged into the master bedroom and rifled through my bag until I found my sketch book and favorite mechanical pencil, careful not to leave a trail of dirt everywhere
. Then I went out to sit on the deck. I started with the hard lines of the house. I wasn’t sure where the property lines were, so I made another list with all my to-do items. First, I was going to need to find the plat map, and I didn’t remember seeing that in the garage. Without Jesse’s signature as owner, I wasn’t really sure how far I was going to get and I wanted to do as much as possible without bugging him.

For now, I would just guess. I thought about how we wanted to use the yard and what outdoor rooms would be the most amazing spaces. I sketched in a fire pit and a big sitting area, then added a flowerbed, a strip of lawn, another seating area with a big trellis, an oversized swing, more flowerbeds, a winding strip of grass that meandered through the yard, carrying visitors from
one magical point to another. This wasn’t going to be a large glob of grass and a few flowers. This was going to be multiple rooms joined together with small, easily maintainable sections of grass. Besides, I didn’t want the headache of watering and mowing a huge lawn while Jesse was away on tour.

As my fingers worked
across the page, I got lost in the imagery of what I knew I could create. For the last several semesters I’d done everything on the computer and now it was so nice to be able to return to why I’d originally fallen into the beauty of landscape architecture. An hour easily passed as I added in trees and shrubs, flowers that would attract butterflies, tall grasses that would add height and whispers. It crystallized in my mind and I was nearly giddy at the prospect of not only being able to design my own yard but being the feet on the ground to put it in.

I set the notebook aside and grabbed my other list. Even without knowing the property lines, I could
still get started. There was a ton of work to do and this would likely take the rest of the summer, but I welcomed the distraction. My phone chirped and I glanced at the screen. I was Kerri. I didn’t bother texting her back, but swiped her name and waited excitedly to hear her voice.

“Hey!”

“Hey yourself. What are you up to?” she asked.

“Oh, nothing much, just sitting at my house, sketching out my yard.
”

“
What? Okay, you have some explaining to do. Are you at your mom’s?”

“
No.” I laughed. “I have a ton to tell you and maybe even an assignment. Do you want to go shopping with me.” I paused. “Or are you to busy with Axel?”

“
Hell no! I’m never too busy to hang out with my girl.”

“
Great! I’ll pick you up in fifteen?”

“
I’ll be ready.”

I’m not sure which of us was more excited to see the other one, but there was a lot of squealing and hugging.
“I’m so glad to see you.”

I hugged her back.
“Me too.”

“So it’s your turn to spill it. What is going on between you two?”

“Can I tell you while we drive?”

“If we’re driving to shopping.”

I laughed. We got in the car and I explained everything that had happened between me and Jesse including the botched engagement and him asking me to move in.

“
So why do you think you hesitated?”

I gripped the steering wheel and leaned forward. “I don’t know. I
mean, I shouldn’t have. Yeah, he travels a lot, and that’s going to suck , but it’s not like that’s any different than what we’ve been doing. Maybe I’m just not ready for that kind of a step.”

“
You’re over the whole musician thing, right?”

“
I tensed my jaw. I thought so. I think Mom’s reservations about him are probably still affecting my decision a little bit. I mean, she kind of knows firsthand what that’s like.”

Kerri shook her head.
“Yeah, but Jesse’s not your dad. She has to understand that.”

“
I thought so too, but I don’t want them to be at odds against each other. How much fun will that be?”

“
Well, it may just take her some time to come around.”

“
I guess. But do you think that’s enough of a reason for me to be hesitating like I am about marrying him?”

“
Sasha! It’s marriage! I’d think you were crazy if you didn’t hesitate.”

I glanced over at her.
“Really?”

She grabbed my
hand and pulled it into her lap. “Sasha, I wouldn’t think twice if Axel asked me, but I’ve never been the one to think through decisions and you’ve always given me shit about that. You’re the one who maps out everything. Of course you’re going to have some reservations about something as huge as marriage. This is the rest of your life you’re talking about. What about school?”

I
sighed. “Yeah. What about school?”

“
How much do you have left?”

“
Depends on how big of a class load I want to try, but at least one semester, probably two if I’m smart about it.”

“
And we know you will be.”

I laughed.

“Okay, so two semesters.”

“
Well you can’t quit this close to the finish line then. And just because you guys are engaged doesn’t mean you have to get married next week.”

“
True. But we know how fast Jesse likes to move, so by the time I do say yes to the engagement, he’ll already be planning the wedding and hiring the preacher.”

Kerri laughed. “Yeah, that’s no kidding. Maybe you not agreeing to his engagement will get him to think that
through a little bit.”

“
Maybe.” I flipped my blinker and pulled into the garden center parking lot. “Maybe.”

We picked out plants and I made Kerri schlep them around with me. There were a
couple of cute burly boys working there who I remembered from the rugby team—one that had even hit on Kerri if I remembered right, but if they ever did anything together it was a one-nighter. He tried to start up a conversation with her but she was oblivious to his flirting, and that made me really happy inside. Axel had won her over forever and I couldn’t be happier for them.

“Do you guys rent backhoes or
skid steer?” I asked the one who was trying to flirt—Kit, his nametag said.

He blinked and looked up from Kerri’s disinter
ested stare. As his gaze traveled up and down the length of me, I put my hands on my hips and dared him to make a comment. “Uh, yeah, but—”

“How much are they and who do I need to talk to?”

He pointed at the manager’s office. “Buck is in there, he’s the guy who will need to approve a driver.” He elbowed his buddy and I didn’t think they were near as funny as they did.

“Great. Load this stuff in a delivery
truck. I’m going to talk to Buck to have them delivered with a skid steer.” I didn’t bother waiting for a response and Kerri barely even gave them a glance. She was bent over her phone with a perma-grin and texting like mad. I elbowed her. “Give it a rest.”

She looked up and blinked. “Wha
t?”

I shook my head but
couldn’t help smiling. “You’ve got it bad.”

She grinned. “Yeah.”

I knocked on the door to the office. An older burly guy was inside, frowning at a computer. He rubbed his forehead and looked up. “Yeah?”

“Hi. The guys at the register said I needed to talk to you about renting a machine.”

He looked me up and down too, but I didn’t give him a chance to say no. “Look, I’m a landscape architecture major, I’ve driven them before, I have a client to take care of and I’ll pay a deposit.”

He
adjusted the brim of his hat. “We got an account on you?”

I nod
ded and gave him Jesse’s name. “His general contractor’s been using it for a month and I’m on the account.”

He poked at the computer with his fat fingers, then his eyes widened just enough
that I knew he recognized the name—and probably the credit limit. He glanced up at me. “What did you say you needed?”

“A
skid steer for now, backhoe later.” I wasn’t sure I would ever need the bigger machine, but I didn’t want to have to go through this a second time.

After he punched some buttons, he rattled off the address on the screen.
“That where we’re delivering?”

I nod
ded. “Please. We’re headed there now so I can meet the crew.” I pointed toward the register. “I just picked up a ton of plants. Will you make sure they bring those?”

“Yes.” He st
ood and held out his hand. “You just let me know if you need anything, anything at all. I can send guys over too, if you get into some bigger elements that you need a crew for.”

I smile
d. Jesse had made this pretty easy for me. “Thanks.”

I drop
ped Kerri off at her place and grabbed a salad from the Wendy’s drive thru. I wasn’t really hungry, but Drake would kick my ass if he found out that I wasn’t eating, especially with the amount of exertion I did this morning. Maybe I should pick up a small fridge later today and get it installed.

My
phone rang as I pulled into the driveway but I let it ring a few times because I was totally distracted by the new look of the entry now. It wasn’t perfect—far from it actually—but it was starting to look like someone lived here instead of an abandoned road to nowhere.

I missed the call, but it turned out to be the general manager, so after a bit of phone tag I managed to get the kitchen pieces ordered, along with a temporary fridge to be delivered later today and set up in the garage.
Now I could go grocery shopping after my plants got here and then I wouldn’t have to leave for anything.

I got out of the car and wander
ed across what would soon be our lawn. If I didn’t have to leave, it would happen even sooner.

The sun wandered across the sky and I made a few adjustments to my lines, thinking through the plan in my head. I could barely
contain my excitement and I wanted the stuff to get here right now.