“Yeah. It was a really nice gesture.”
“So what’s gonna happen with you and him now?” he probes.
“We’ll wait and see how it goes while they’re touring in Europe!” I yell back and shrug.
The music sets in, and the band comes on stage. Gavin is walking on crutches, and there’s a high stool and a microphone stand waiting for him on the far side. He sits down first.
“Are you ready to rock this joint?” Linden calls into the mic.
This is the first time I see him in his pop-star role. They normally play their own instruments and all, but for this first song, it’s just song and dance. I look up at him and smile as I watch them perform.
He throws me a few glances in between moves, and then he winks at me. A lot of girls behind me will probably go home wondering whether he winked at them. I don’t mind that now, because I know he loves me.
My friends are swaying, tapping their feet, or nodding with the beat. Draven, Ave, Delsin, and Thierry are more reluctant to let go, because it’s not really their kind of music, but even I have learned to like their songs, despite my penchant for hard rock. It’s an acquired taste. Or maybe I’m just biased due to my penchant for the sexy lead singer.
It’s unbearably hot in here, though, which makes me long for the intermission.
***
When the much-needed break is over and they’ve played an awesome show, they announce the final song. Linden looks straight at me.
“Tonight, there is a very special person here in the audience. She helped us write the new song you just heard. Thally, would you please come up here for a moment?” He leans down and reaches out his hand.
I stare up at him like a deer in headlights and shake my head.
He laughs into the microphone. “She seems to be a little shy, so I guess you all need to help me get her up here. Thally, Thally, Thally,” he starts, and soon enough, the people behind me are picking up the chant.
“Thally, Thally, Thally,” my friends chime in, and then a security guy as broad as a barrel lifts me up. Linden has put the mic in his pocket and grabs me around my waist, pulling me up on stage.
“What is going on here?” I ask under my breath.
“You’ll see.” He smiles gleefully. “Or, better yet, you’ll hear.” Then he takes me by the hand and leads me to center stage. “Please give a hand for Thally,” he calls into his mic.
“But I don’t want to sing with you,” I whine very quietly.
“You won’t have to, even though I would love that,” he reassures me in a whisper. “This is about something else.” He holds the microphone close to his lips again, pulling a folded piece of paper from his other pocket. Then he says loudly, for everyone to hear, “You told me you’d give me another chance if I took the stars out of the sky for you. Well, I did the next best thing.” He unfolds the paper, and I can see it’s some kind of certificate. “I couldn’t pry those damn things loose, but I named one of them after you, Thalia.” The slip of paper confirms it.
He named a star after me.
The tears start to well in my eyes, and I wipe them away, overwhelmed. “Oh my God,” I breathe.
“I have something else for you, and for all the other people here, too,” he announces. “I bet they’re glad I left the stars where they are. This is a cover, but I think it expresses perfectly how things were between us in the beginning.” He glances at his bandmates, who stand ready with their instruments, and nods.
And then a melody starts—a still very familiar one, because I still listen to this band today. No, this time I’m not talking about Westlife.
Alexis speaks the first line, before Linden joins him and starts to sing, “From the first day that I saw your smiling face, honey, I knew that we would be together forever.”
Linden goes on one knee in front of me and takes my hand as he sings the rest of the song. I get goosebumps everywhere, and I can hardly see through the veil of my tears. I’m deeply touched that he’s singing this for me, only for me, in front of everyone.
The guys’ voices come together for the last chorus. They circle me and hand me several red roses each, until I’m holding a bouquet in my hands.
“Oh my God,” I sniffle, when the song is over and the applause washes over us. I’m glad nobody can hear me sobbing over the audience freaking out and cheering.
Linden straightens again and then kisses me in front of all his fans, which impresses me greatly. “I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
“Thally, Thally, Thally!” my friends in the press pit are chanting again.
“I’m going to get down again,” I say in my small voice, absolutely overwhelmed with all he just did for me.
He smiles. “Okay,” he whispers, before he kisses me again and then says into his mic, “Ladies and gentlemen, another round of applause for Thally, please.”
The noise is deafening, and then the security guy helps me get down.
“Oh my God, that was so cute!” Hailey squeals in my ear.
“Oh yes, and it wasn’t the least bit overwhelming,” I say dryly.
“All right, and now we have one more song for you,” the band says on stage. “Are you ready for ‘Without You I’ll Die?’”
Dale sings along and hops up and down to the beat, which I find utterly adorable. I’m glad I’m not the only one enjoying the evening.
After an encore, the band waves goodbye again and disappears backstage. We slowly start to leave our privileged space as well. I walk back into Linden’s dressing room, where I set down the roses and the star certificate. Nobody else is in here, so I quickly take off my panties under my skirt. I want to seduce him slowly, though I suspect we’ll end up having a quickie on the dressing table once he finds out I’m not wearing any underwear.
When he comes in, he greets me with a satisfied smile. “I’m totally exhausted,” he pants, before he wraps me in his arms.
I put my arms around his neck and pull his head down to my height. “You took me by surprise.”
“That was the idea.”
“A star called Thalia is a wonderful token,” I whisper.
“And here I thought the song was the big deal,” he chuckles.
“That doesn’t count,” I counter. “Someone else wrote it.”
“Oh … Then I should write another love song for our next album.”
“I wouldn’t say no to that, but you don’t have to. You … you didn’t take the stars out of the sky for me, but you named one in my honor, and … I know how lucky I am to have you by my side.” I’m struggling to declare my feelings.
“I wanted to prove my love for you.”
“Shh,” I say, putting a finger on his lips. Then I help him chuck off his unbuttoned shirt. “I love you, Linden Priest.”
His smile widens, but before he can say anything, I kiss him passionately. Linden stumbles with me to the white leather couch. He sits down and pulls me with him so I come to sit on his lap. I open the fly of his jeans without breaking the kiss. Linden lifts his butt and pushes the jeans and the boxers down with an impatient hand. When his hard penis juts out at me, I wrap my hand around it and start moving it up and down slowly.
Linden moans, and I poke the tip of my tongue against his. We let our passion dictate the intensity of our kiss, getting intoxicated with our mutual arousal. He pulls the top of my strapless dress down, followed by my bra, and then he cups my breasts with his hands, massaging them gently. As we lose ourselves more and more in this never-ending kiss, I scoot even closer.
His hand moves between my legs, but he pulls it back after touching my labia. He breaks the kiss and gives me a wide-eyed look. “You’re not wearing panties.”
“I know. I took them off,” I explain with a grin.
“When?”
“Before you came in,” I whisper close to his ear, and then I start nibbling on his earlobe.
Linden takes charge, lifting my butt and positioning me so he can enter me without obstacle. I moan loudly as he
glides into me, inch by perfect inch. I’m too aroused to go slow, so I move up and down and in circles, closing my eyes when he begins to thrust upwards to match my rhythm.
He sucks one of my nipples into his mouth, nibbling on it until I moan more loudly. Then he puts a hand over my mouth, probably so his friends won’t hear what we’re doing in here.
Neither of us is going to last much longer; I can feel that. I pull away his hand and swallow his own moan with my kiss.
We still have our lips locked when the climax crashes over us like a tsunami wave. I’m shaken to the core, so I bury my face in the hollow of his neck afterwards, waiting for my breath to still.
“Oh God,” he pants.
I kiss the sensitive skin on his throat. “And now we’re going to the party?” I ask in a whisper.
“I’d much rather carry you home and get you into my bed,” he says breathlessly, “but yes, we’re going to the party
***
After we’ve cleaned up and gotten dressed again, a large limousine brings us to the after party, which takes place in a local club. Linden introduces me to a few more friends, including his brother, Jayden, who I find myself talking to for the first time.
“How long are you going to be in Austin, Thally?”
“I’ll be here the whole summer,” I say. “I’m working at my dad’s company until the semester starts up again in Miami.”
“Right. Advertising and such. You created the promo campaign for the European tour, right?”
“Well, not alone. Two more experienced guys did the lion’s share of the work.”
“Still, the campaign looks really good.” Jayden smiles. “I’m sure people will love your work.”
“Maybe. We’ll see,” I say modestly.
Linden joins us. “Can I steal my honey from you?”
“She’s all yours.” Jayden smirks.
“Thanks, dude.” Linden grabs my hand and leads me to where my friends are standing together in a cluster.
“Linden, why … is this another one of your overwhelming secret plans?” I ask, wary of their broadly grinning faces.
“Me? Plans? Never,” he laughs. Then he hands me a Jell-O shot from a tray behind them. All my friends have one, too. “Ready?” he asks them.
“What is this?” I ask. I knew it!
Delsin and Ave start snapping their fingers, while Nate, Thierry, and Draven drum a beat on the bar stools and my girl friends sing a soft “Ooooh.”
My eyebrows shoot up. “Guys?” is the only thing I can say.
“You are the love of my life, you are the key to happiness. My heart is yours and yours is mine, so let me tell you that I really love you,” Linden sings.
“Oh no,” I giggle. I’d hoped the Backstreet Boys cover was the most romantic he could get, but I was wrong. Dang! Even though this is definitely too cheesy for my taste, I’m still touched by this new display of affection. And it’s so cool that my friends are playing along in his scheme.
“Your love is the best thing that ever happened to me, and I will love you forever. I gave you a star, I gave you my heart. I’ve been addicted to you, ’cause you’re the greatest woman I’ve ever met,” he finishes.
“That was freestyle, right? Your very own words?” I ask, warmed by his sincerity.
He shrugs modestly.
“Of course it was freestyle,” Delsin pipes up, “and he bribed us into doing it.”
I laugh out loud and give Linden a hug. “You’re so cute!”
“Don’t forget that we’re cute, too,” Cami says with a chuckle.
I hug every single one of them, thank them, and press kisses to their cheeks. “You really are the best! I drink to you … well, I eat to you,” I specify, before slurping down my Jell-O shot.
The others raise their little cups and down their own shots, except Dale, who never touches alcohol. Then Linden takes my hand again and tells me to follow him. We start climbing the stairs, up and up we go, until we end up on the roof of the building.
“What’s next? A helicopter flight?” I ask, only half joking after all the things he’s already surprised me with.
He points to a small telescope. “I want to show you something.” He squints into the telescope and adjusts it, checking something on his phone screen. “Babe, you have to see this,” he murmurs.
I come to stand next to him.
“Come on, take a look,” he urges me.
“What has gotten into you now?” I ask.
“Just look at this, will you?”
“All right, all right.” I laugh, and then I squint through the telescope at the starry night sky.
“That’s your star, right in the center of the scope,” he says softly.
I lift my eyes to meet his gaze. “Really?”
“Yes. That’s Thalia 612, right next to Linden 318.”
“So those two are our very own lucky stars?”
He nods. “For all eternity.”
I don’t know what to say, so I look through the telescope again, at the lazily twinkling pair of stars. “God … beautiful.”
“You may call me Linden,” he chuckles.
I straighten and kiss the corner of his mouth. “If I ever had any doubts about your sincerity, you wiped them away with this wonderful gift.”
We sit down on the roof and look up at the stars. “I love you, Thalia,” Linden murmurs into my ear.
“I love you, too,” I reply, after recovering from the tingling shudder that ran down my back when his lips brushed my earlobe. I lay my head on his shoulder. “Now I know what Nate meant.”
“About what?”
“Meant when he told me what love is.”
“What is love?”
“Love is when you sit next to someone, not even doing anything,” I whisper, “and yet you’re indescribably happy just to be with that person.”
Linden nods slowly. “He’s right.” He puts an arm around me and caresses the sensitive skin in the crook of my arm. “And I still believe we will make it.”
“We will make it, yes.”
“What makes you so certain all of a sudden?” Linden asks, surprised.
“You.”
“Me?”
“Yes, you, Linden Priest. You are the man who banished my fears, made me forget that our love could falter and die. You make every day special and now you’ve even given me a star.” I smile.
“And you brought me back to life,” he says happily. “Before you entered my life, everything seemed barren and boring, but now … Now the world is filled with color and music again, and life is worth living. I’ve found the most amazing woman of all. Forget the initial hurdles, forget that damned Pierce, because from now on, we’re the only ones that count.”
“I’ll miss you when you’re touring,” I say softly.
“Don’t think about that now. I’ll put in a few days here and there, and I’ll head straight for Miami whenever I can. I’ll be circling in your orbit, like Linden 318 circles Thalia 612.”
“I’m not sure stars have orbits, but I get the point.” I grin. “I don’t even know why I fought my feelings in the beginning.”
“Don’t ask me, but from what you told me, I think it was your head that told you that you shouldn’t fall in love with me. Not your heart. I’d be interested to hear what your head says now.”
“‘Never ever let him go.’”
“Really?” Linden probes.
“Really … and it also has a few other, unspeakable ideas, but I think we’ll discuss those in your bedroom,” I giggle.
“It would be a pleasure, Miss Leroux.”
“No, don’t start the Fifty Shades talk again,” I demand in mock seriousness.
“My apologies,” he chuckles.
I tuck a strand of my hair behind my ear, before laying my head on his shoulder.
“You still do that.”
“What?”
“The small things. The ones I love so much about you.”
“Old habits die ha
rd.” I smile as I look at him.
I doubted that we could make it. I doubted that he really loved me, and now I know he would do anything for me.
Linden leans closer and kisses me gently, while above us, our stars twinkle in the summer night, together with a million more.
*** The End ***
Dear readers,
Wow! Just wow. My Coral Gables series already comprises three books, and I’m really speechless when I think of its success so far. I tend to doubt whether my stories are any good, but you inspire and motivate me. Your support means a lot, and it drives me forward.
I invite feedback, and I’m happy to receive each and every bit, via Facebook, Twitter, and email. You’re unbelievable, and I want to say thank you!
Love,
Drucie
Rights and Other Boring Stuff
The rights for all songs that are named or quoted in this book belong to the respective songwriters, bands, or record companies.
Brands that are mentioned are also the property of the respective companies.
The band Downstair Alley is purely a product of my imagination.
Linden: Rocking Pleasure: New Adult College Romance (Coral Gables Series Book 3) Page 30
