by Lux,Vivian
Then I opened my eyes, looked at my sister and let that vision slip away.
"Well, we're a package deal, so if you want me to play for you, you gotta listen to her too. That's just the way it's gotta be."
And that was the way it was. I played drums competently and Pep blew them away with her talent and that was that. Ruthless was formed and the rest was history. And I was never alone.
Whether it was as a twin or now part of the band, I was always a face in a crowd.
This stupid ad was the first thing I had ever done on my own.
And I hated how much I liked it.
Guilt had been my companion for so long it had become comfortable. Like an old drinking buddy. Everyone told me it wasn't my fault what happened to my sister. A parade of therapists all echoed that same tired line. I never believed them. How could I? Hadn't I always been told I was responsible for my sister? Even when we were five?
But when my mother took those pills and washed them down with a bottle of wine, she took some of that blame away from me and onto herself. I always considered it her last motherly act. A gift to set both me and Pepper free.
But this was new guilt. And I'm not some introspective fucker, no matter how many hours of therapy I've suffered through. With a long life's worth of experience behind me, I knew the quickest way around guilt was finding a distraction.
A date with Zoe was exactly what I needed.
Once I was changed back into my normal, regular, non-deconstructed tuxedo clothes, I step out of the green room, and into pandemonium.
"Holy fuck," I muttered as I surveyed the scene. Behind the barriers, a gaggle of girls pressed tightly around. As soon as they spotted me, the shout went up, and they all rushed forward. The security guard looked completely pissed off.
"Holy fuck," I repeated.
"Low!" A petite Asian girl with the prettiest smile aside from Zoe's grinned up at me. "Will you sign this?"
She thrust a torn out black-and-white copy of the ad in my direction.
"Holy fuck," I repeated once more for good measure.
But then I grinned. "Will it make you happy sweetheart?" I asked her.
The way her cheeks turned pink when I called her sweetheart could be completely addicting. "Oh my God, oh my God," was all she could say.
I took the ad from her, all the while expecting her to snatch it back, to remember that I was just a godforsaken drummer, who belonged behind the scenes. I was not the star, never wanted to be, but this? This feeling I got as I signed my name, my new name, over and over again for the throng of adoring women who called out for me. And only me?
I could get used to this.
Chapter 13
Zoe
I stood stock still in the center of the floor and let out a quick, "ohh," of realization. It finally hit me what this place reminded me of.
Low wasn't going to be free until just before eight, so he suggested we meet at a basement bar called 6 Steps Down because it was nice and private. In fact, it was so private that I walked past twice before I spotted the entrance. I could see why Low chose it. The interior was dark and intimate, with these sexy little corner booths that had high enough partitions between them that all sorts of hanky-panky could be happening in private and you'd never know.
At first, the prospect of hanky-panky absorbed my attention completely, but the longer I had to wait for Low, the more my attention was captured by the space itself. With its long, narrow rectangular room, and low-slung ceiling, it was shaped exactly like a shoebox.
I felt like a character in one of the dioramas I used to make back in grammar school.
Although my pilgrims and pioneers definitely wore more clothing than I had on right now.
I yanked at the hem of my dress. It was riding up my thigh every time I moved, higher and higher each time.
Where the hell was he?
All day long my emotions had veered wildly. My thoughts climbed up to the heavens and holy shit I'm going on a date with a rock star then plunged right back down to You're making a fool out of yourself.
I yanked at my skirt again, as it threatened to creep up to gynecological lengths. Low was now twenty minutes late.
"Fuck the shit," I muttered to myself. "I should go home before I give somebody a free show."
I'd been so fucking happy. And now I was angry. But angry was good. If I could stay angry, the maybe I wouldn't start to feel sad.
Because if I started feeling sad, I feared I'd stay that way forever, just out of habit.
I moved away from the bar, taking my first step towards the door, and home, and ice cream, and the couch, and then maybe the TV and some crying over The Bachelor before bed.
And that's when I saw him.
He loped through the front door and that energy of his was coiled up tightly enough to nearly knock me backward from across the room. He was tall, my god how have I never noticed how tall he is? He's so narrowly built, that he looks kind of small when he sits but holy shit there's nothing small about him. He's like a sexy tree or something.
Jesus, Zoe, down girl.
He spotted me. Of course, there was no way he could miss me, standing there frozen in place like I was. But his eyes lit up with that warm, amber glow they gave off. Like they were lit from within, bringing back memories of fires from a childhood I'd never had.
Nostalgic eyes I decided. That's what he had. They felt like home.
He rushed up to me, looking abashed and more than a little freaked out. "I am so sorry," he said clasping my hand in his huge one. "I'm so sorry for making you wait like this." He opened his mouth and then closed it, shaking his head. "I got stuck."
He looked too freaked out for me to really enjoy the feel of my hand in his. I drew back, worried. "Are you okay?" I asked. He looked frantic and almost hunted.
He shook his head, and took a deep, steadying breath. "Look, I know I just got here but would you mind going somewhere quieter with me?" I cocked my head at him in confusion. It was very quiet in here, nothing more than the low murmur of voices and the clink of glassware.
But I didn't think it was the noise level that was bothering him. "I've been signing autographs all damn day and I just need to not be around people for a second."
"I'm people."
He touched my face. "You're a person. Not people. A person I really want to spend time with too." The corner of his mouth tightened. "Just promise me you won't ask me for my autograph."
I laughed. "Damn, there goes my secret plans." I tugged at my skirt again. "Honestly, going someplace else would be totally fine with me. As long as we can go somewhere I can set this stupid dress on fire."
He grinned like I'd said exactly the right thing. "I threw that tuxedo you hated in the back of my car. You wanna burn that too?"
I raised an eyebrow. "I usually wait until the third date to ritualistically burn wardrobes, but for that tux, I'll make an exception."
He followed me out to my car. I pulled out a pair of yoga pants that were balled up on the floor, pulled them on under my dress and breathed a sigh of relief once my ass was safely contained.
I turned around and caught him grinning at me. "What?"
"You're cute as fucking hell," he replied.
"How did you get here?" I asked. "I can drive, where are we going?"
He looked down. "Somewhere quiet would be cool."
A little flicker of caution rippled through me. "You're not going to kill me and start wearing my skin, right?"
"Hadn't thought about it, no. Is that a thing people do on dates?" He nonchalantly reached out and opened my door for me, waited until I was settled in to shut it, the walked around to the passenger side.
"Are you going to be able to fit in here?" I called.
"I'm surprisingly flexible," he said. And he wasn't lying. The way he folded his long body into the seat of my Toyota made me think of origami.
His grin was going to be the death of me. "So this is a shit date so far, right?"
"Why woul
d you say that?"
"I honestly am asking. I don't know how to do this shit properly. I haven't dated much."
"You haven't dated much?" He had to be fucking with me. He was practically built for sex.
He gave a rueful grin. "You sound surprised."
"I actually am, what with the whole," I gestured to him, trying to encompass the floppy sex hair, the amber sex eyes, the rippled sex body... "Rockstar thing," I finished lamely.
He sighed and leaned back against the seat. The top of his head brushed the ceiling of my car. "We tour," he explained. "A fucking lot. It's not like I haven't wanted to date, it's more like, I don't really want to do that shit to someone."
"Do that shit?" I echoed.
"You know, leave all the time."
I chuckled. "Aren't we on a date? Or have I wildly misconstrued everything?"
"I'm home for a while now." He turned looked at me steadily. "I'm not going anywhere."
I nearly drove off the road. The way he said it, the way it hung in the air, heavy like the reverberation of a church bell that had just sounded... It sounded like words he had said before, a promise he had made... that he had kept. I knew it just as surely as I knew my own name.
He kept his fucking promise...to whoever it was he had made it to.
"Oh," was all I could say. It sounded completely inadequate.
But it was apparently the right thing to say because he smiled and leaned back again.
The silence that filled my car was not awkward and that was weird. There were very few people I knew how to be silent with. Usually, if a space in the conversation lasted longer than seven seconds, I just ached to fill it. It was my nature. I needed to smooth things over, make sure things were comfortable, and I did that by chattering on with the rapid-fire delivery of a machine gun. When things got quiet, I just started brain dumping all over the place until something I said landed right and the conversation resumed.
I didn’t feel like I needed to do this with Low and I didn't know why. But I liked it.
In the silence, I realized I had been heading to the coast, setting my sights on an overlook that used to serve as a makeout point for the kids in my high school. When I realized what I was doing, I blushed. Makeout Point? How old am I?
But Low seemed to know my intentions and what's more, he very much approved of them. He leaned forward and pointed to a sharp left up ahead. "Turn here," he said, tapping out a quick, staccato rhythm on his thighs.
"Do you drum in your sleep, too?" I wondered.
"Dunno." He grinned. "Maybe you could let me know?" An innocent question followed by a deeply wicked grin.
"Am I sleeping with you?" I asked cheekily, throwing the car into park. The sun was slipping into the water, bathing the sky in a gentle wash of oranges and pinks.
"Are you?"
Low opened his door and ran around to the driver's side. When he opened the door and offered me his hand to help me to my feet, I felt as beautiful as the sunset. "How about I..."
I trailed off. He wasn't listening to me, he was cocking his head, staring like I had sprouted a third arm in the center of my chest.
"What?"
"You're going to laugh at me."
"Probably."
He smiled. "Okay, fair enough. But you look, like, really pretty." He reached out and lifted a lock of my hair up, exposing my neck. "And I, um, kind of want to take your picture."
I wanted to laugh but he was looking at me so seriously that it fizzled out inside of me, leaving just a warm, spreading softness in its place. "You like taking my picture," I said, absentmindedly twirling that lock around my finger. It felt warm from the setting sun and warmer from where he had touched it.
"I do," he said, looking me straight in the eye. A simple, straightforward declaration, that was all it was. "Do you like letting me take your picture?"
I swallowed, but the lump in my throat wouldn't budge. "Yes," I breathed. "I do. Just you, though."
He took me by the arm and shifted me around. "Right there." He reached in his pocket. "I only have my phone. But that's okay. Just...look at me." He looked at the screen then back up at me, his thumb over the button. "God. Zoe, I wish you... you're not seeing what I'm seeing, I know." I looked down, blushing, and heard the sound of the shutter clicking. "Shit. I wish I was like, a fucking poet or something. But I'm a dumbass when it comes to words. I'll just fucking show you." He held the phone out. "That. That's how beautiful you are."
I leaned forward to look at the picture, and then just kept leaning forward until my lips met his.
Chapter 14
Low
Everything within me unraveled the second I tasted those lips again.
It wasn't just how sexy Zoe was. Sexy body, sexy hair, sexy little smile that she flashed against my mouth, laughing into me like this was the best game she'd ever played. It's that intoxicating mix of hers. She somehow managed to walk this invisible line between shyness and confidence, between innocence and knowing. It's the little emotions that played across her face when I pulled back and locked eyes with her, wondering if she wanted what I wanted. When I saw it - that flicker of every single emotion so plain across her face - I was already nearly gone, but when she nodded slightly, answering the question I didn't even need to ask because we were so right in tune with each other...
I completely lost it.
Part of being in a band is sensing where your bandmates are at. That unspoken ESP, where you know someone so well that you can tell what they're going to do before they do it. I'd only met this girl a few days ago, but I was already feeling that excitement of being in sync with someone.
I knew her, even without knowing her.
I knew what she wanted and I wanted to give it to her more than anything.
I knew how she wanted to be kissed, hard and demanding.
I knew that she wanted me to break down her barriers for her. So I did it willingly, pressing her back against the hood of her car, warm beneath us, letting her run her hands the whole length of my body.
I let her explore without stopping because I knew that she needed to feel me, feel what she did to me, and understand that this...whatever it was...was something that I was just as eager to see happen as she was.
She pressed her hands to my chest, and I pulled back to hear her say, "I want you to know...."
"That you usually don't do this?" I finished for her. I could feel a smile tugging at my lips, but I knew that she was serious and so I suppressed my laugh behind my teeth and watched her face carefully.
She dragged her teeth along her bottom lip, and I felt her hesitate. "Aw fuck it. Why lie?" She pressed her lips to the hollow of my throat and laughed. "I used to," she whispered. "But it's been a long, long time."
"How long?"
"A year?" She ducked away from me.
"Is that freaking you out?"
"Yeah. A little bit."
I got that feeling again, that feeling like I just understood what she was saying without her having to say it. "And you want this to be worth the year long wait?"
Her eyes flashed at me, catching what little sunlight there was left in the sky. She didn't say anything. She didn't need to.
"Don't worry, baby," I promised her. "I will make this so good you'll forget the last year and then some."
She panted breathlessly against my chest. "I was hoping you'd say that."
She held my gaze and then stepped back. She bit her lip once again, and then her shoulders squared, and her chin jutted out and I fucking loved the line she walked between delicate and fierce.
"Take my picture," she ordered.
"Yeah?" I swallowed. I was rock hard in an instant.
"Yes," she said firmly. "Take my picture, and then...take our picture."
I closed my hand into a tight fist and tried to exhale away the heat that flooded my chest when she said that. She was getting me going too fast...and fuck all we'd done was kiss... but if she got me too worked up this wasn't going to be as good as I wa
nted it to be. I needed to cool it for this to be the best it could be... for both of us.
I reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone. "I'm ready," I told her.
But I wasn't ready at all. I don't think I could ever fully prepare myself for the Zoe I saw unleashed in front of my camera.
She tore off her ridiculously short dress and flung it upward and I caught a shot of her elegant arm cast upward, framed by the last rays of the setting sun. I caught her laugh, the whoop, her smile that had gone from sexy to exuberantly, unabashedly happy. Through the shitty lens of my shitty camera, she looked happier and freer than I'd seen her yet and I just kept clicking, mesmerized by what I was seeing.
"Zoe," I said thickly. I felt like my throat was going to close. Her skin shone gold in the sunset and it seemed like my fingers would catch on fire if I didn't touch her right then. "Christ, you're beautiful."
She leveled her gaze with mine and then reached behind her. My thumb was doing all the work now because I was just staring dumbly at her. She moved like a woman in a trance, unfastening her bra and flinging it away.
"Fuck," I groaned.
"Do you like them?"
"They're fucking perfect."
"Touch them."
I staggered forward like a zombie, but she caught my wrist. "Take a picture while you do," she whispered.
My cock was straining at a right angle, but I fumbled with my phone and caught the moment when my hand covered her breast. Unlike the moment we shared at the party, this moment could never slip away from us again. I'd always have a record of the second my hand touched her bare breast, slipping along that petal-soft skin. I'd always be able to see that smile of hers when my hand roamed downwards, tracing the curve of her waist. First moment after first moment and there would be a record of each one. "You're the smartest girl I ever met," I said, utterly dumbstruck.
Her little giggle melted into a soft sigh as my hand traced the heavy curve. She was soft in all the right places, firm in all the other ones. She let out a little moan when I lowered my mouth to lick and suckle her perfectly rosy nipples. "Give me the phone," she urged. "I want to take pictures of you as you do that."
