Authors: Lauren Sattersby
Rock N Soul
Riptide Publishing
PO Box 6652
Hillsborough, NJ 08844
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. All person(s) depicted on the cover are model(s) used for illustrative purposes only.
Rock N Soul
Copyright © 2015 by Lauren Sattersby
Cover art: L.C. Chase,
lcchase.com/design.htm
Editor: Carole-ann Galloway
Layout: L.C. Chase,
lcchase.com/design.htm
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher, and where permitted by law. Reviewers may quote brief passages in a review. To request permission and all other inquiries, contact Riptide Publishing at the mailing address above, at
Riptidepublishing.com
, or at
[email protected]
.
ISBN: 978-1-62649-310-0
First edition
January, 2016
Also available in paperback:
ISBN: 978-1-62649-311-7
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I’m Tyler Lindsey, and until recently, I had an okay apartment, an okay girlfriend, and an okay job as a bellboy at a respectable Boston hotel. Then rock star Chris Raiden
died
right before I brought his room service—stiffing me on the tip, by the way—and my life went to hell. My fifteen minutes of fame was more like five seconds, and my girlfriend left me in disgust.
But even worse
—
Chris is haunting me. Not the room where he died, like a normal ghost. No, somehow he’s stuck to
me
and is insisting on taking care of a bunch of unfinished business in
California
. So now I have to traipse across the country with the world’s most narcissistic ghost.
But . . . I keep having these weird thoughts. Thoughts about how much I like the way he makes me laugh. Thoughts where I kind of want to kiss the emo-narcissist, even though he’s a
ghost
and an asshole and I can’t touch him anyway. And even if I could, what will happen when he finishes his business and nothing’s keeping him here anymore?
For those who read this story and gave me encouragement, all of whom are—shockingly—still speaking to me after months of listening to me complain my way through writing it.
For Sarah, because no one else can put up with my brand of crazy as well as she can and I’m eternally grateful for her.
And for the nameless bellboy I watched for a grand total of ten seconds one day, years ago, who I looked at and said, “Yes. This man is clearly having a love affair with a sarcastic ghost. I should write that.” This one’s for you.
I didn’t actually hear a chorus of angels singing when I saw the bag of grapes sitting on the refrigerated shelf of a tiny Asian food store at two in the morning, but I definitely heard it in the back of my mind. Here, sitting before me, was a miracle. Red grapes. In a store that was still open. The words on the bag were Korean so I had no idea if the grapes were seedless or not, but Chris Raiden had been waiting for his room service for over an hour now. Which meant we were quickly approaching the point where a famous rock star’s wrath over late food might trump his wrath over seeds in said food, so they’d have to do either way.
Still, it’s always best to know exactly why I’d be getting fired, so I reached into the bag and pulled out a grape, then popped it into my mouth.
And the angels sang again because there wasn’t a seed. This beautiful, perfect plastic bag in this beautiful, perfect Asian food mart contained red. Seedless. Grapes.
“Hey,” a voice called from the direction of the cash register. “You can’t eat those. You have to pay.”
“I know, I know.” I snatched the bag from the cooler and trotted up to the register, giving the cashier a big lopsided smile. “Man, you don’t even know how glad I am that you guys are open right now.”
The guy shrugged as he rang up my purchase but didn’t answer. Not that I blamed him. People who have grape-related emergencies at 2 a.m. aren’t generally the type of people you want to be having a conversation with during said emergency. So I just closed my mouth and handed over the corporate card my boss had given me to make the purchase.
Cashier Guy could have been nicer, though. It wasn’t like I’d
asked
to be out running around Beacon Hill in the middle of the fucking night looking for overly specific types of fruit to keep a drugged-out bass player from complaining to my boss, so I felt like I should get a pass on this one. Still, though, there wasn’t time to explain, and I’m not usually that big on small talk with strangers anyway.
After paying for the grapes, I muttered a “Thanks,” scooped up the bag, and started jogging back toward the hotel. I slipped my phone out of my pocket and hit Call on Richard’s number.
“Tell me you got them,” he answered.
“I got them,” I practically crowed.
Richard let out a heavy, relieved sigh. “Thank God. How long will it take you to get back here?”
“I don’t know. Fifteen minutes?”
“
Fifteen
—”
“I’m in Beacon Hill, Richard. It’s gonna take me a bit.” I stopped and scanned the street for cabs. And, in a burst of luck, one rounded the corner just as I was looking. I lifted the hand with the grape bag in it and started flagging like a lunatic. “Hold on. There’s a cab. I’ll be back as soon as I can.” I paused for a moment, fumbling with the phone while I added my other hand to the flagging. “Is he bitching about it?”
“No, he hasn’t called again. But it’s only a matter of time. You know celebrities.”
“I can imagine.” The cab turned toward me and pulled up to the curb so I could get in. I slid in the backseat and gave the driver the hotel address, then went back to the phone. “I’m on my way.”
